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Riding With Robots

@ridingrobots.bsky.social

Robotic solar system exploration, astrophotography, exasperating earnestness. My day job is impersonating your favorite planets and spacecraft on social media for your favorite government agency. Opinions are my own.

1706 Posts2353 Follower1121 Folgt
Daniel Machacek@danielmachacek.bsky.social · 2h ago

Despite radiation and Trump's efforts to kill Juno, our only envoy around Jupiter, this plucky spacecraft still works and is taking images. Here are three examples taken by SRU camera during orbits 77 and 78, showing dark side of Jupiter and its auroras. Credit: NASA/Caltech-JPL/SwRI/D. Machacek.

Black and white image of Jovian Aurora. This image was taken by SRU camera onboard Juno spacecraft (NASA) on October 17, 2025.Black and white image of dark side of Jupiter. This image was taken by SRU camera onboard Juno spacecraft (NASA) on October 17, 2025.Black and white image of Jovian Aurora. This image was taken by SRU camera onboard Juno spacecraft (NASA) on November 19, 2025.
ESA Operations@operations.esa.int · 10h ago

🚨 OPEN CALL: Run your code in deep space! For the first time, we are opening access to a living mission. We’ll be turning our Hera asteroid mission into a flying software lab 150M km from Earth. Open to AI, robotics, gaming, etc! 💻 Submit your idea 👉 t.co/Sn54Xne6Oz

Hera spacecraft next to asteroid crater
Yichao@michaelyichao.com · 11h ago

A standing ovation on stage is nice but have you ever had most of your team emoji react with :lol: to a throwaway joke in the text chat of the all hands

The Planetary Society@planetarysociety.bsky.social · yesterday

🚨URGENT ADVOCACY ACTION - We can pause OMB's harmful rewrite of grant rules that insert political appointees into the funding process, but only if enough of us speak up THIS WEEK. 🚨 This is our best shot before senators leave for August recess. Send your letter: www.planetary.org/advocacy-act...

Advocacy Action Center

The Planetary Society is organizing a new space constituency that is educated, empowered, and loud.

planetary.org

Dan Chibnall@bookowl.bsky.social · yesterday

And the date was on purpose since the story ends on August 5th in California, which is August 6th in Hiroshima. The date the US dropped the bomb. It's probably a coincidence but if you take the peculiar time the robot says "eight-one o'clock" and subtract it from the year (2026-81) you get 1945.

Don Davis@ddavisspaceart.bsky.social · 3d ago

51 years ago I painted a trio of Viking related works for NASA HQ including the widely reproduced one of the landing on Mars. I have reimagined the Landing portrayal in updated form using digital methods of visualization and painting. I chose the same angle but with reality replacing anticipation.

This oil painting portrays the Viking 1 landing on Mars, which appeared in countless publications. The story of this work is relayed in an earlier post and is shown here for comparison with the new portrayal of this very view, showing the event as it would have appeared. This 1975 anticipatory painting was done with oils on a gesso smoothed 16 X 20 canvas panel, using traditional art methods including a tracing paper guide featured earlier. This work shows in retrospect my ideal of the 'spirit of space art', showing something of a summary of what is known of the subject while conveying what it is about the subject's known or theorized attributes that I find visually compelling. The new digital painting updates that visual impression with one based on our current knowledge. The new digital work was also done at the same size as this one was for possible printing purposes, 16 by 20 inches at 300 DPI. #Sciart In 1976 the pair of Viking spacecraft orbiter/lander combos were sent to Mars. Before Viking, Mars was still largely a place of our imaginations, an unknown that we wrote stories about then studied from Earth and space. The dominance of cratered terrain on the portions of Mars photographed by Mariners 4, 6 and 7 gave an initially Lunar impression of that world, which changed during the development of the Viking lander after Mariner 9 revealed the planet. The first landing was aimed for a flat flood plain, judged as a decent place to search for life. The landing date was July 4, however the intended site appeared too rough for comfort in the high quality orbiter photos, causing the landing to wisely be delayed. A smoother site further 'down stream' was found using photo and radar data. The landing proceeded quite nominally, a magnificent achievement that apparently accounted for what it had to and made it the first time. The first photo from the surface was a look at a footpad to see how solid the 'footing' appeared. Then a moderate resolution panorama of the surroundings was obtained, first showing the rocks, hills, dunes-and bright sky. The latter was my biggest surprise as a space artist. The adjustments to the color balance of the later photos were gradually narrowed down. The ubiquitous dust is planet wide, suspended in the air and coloring the sky a luminous tan ochre. This digital painting shows the view a meter above the surface seeing the lander briefly kicking up dust less than a second before touchdown with the footpads 1.4 meters high. The landing rockets were designed with many nozzles to disturb the surroundings as little as possible. The nearby disturbed dust resembles in color that of the sky. We are 6 meters away from the center of the lander. field of view is 60 degrees, we are looking Northwest with the Sun and Earth off the frame to the left. This is a digital art update of the pre mission oil painting I did for NASA HQ 1n 1975. #Sciart