Interesting Photo of the Day: Is This What Mars Looks Like?

Interesting Photos

NASA’s Mars program may be decades away from actually sending a manned mission, and all those fancy vacation plans on the red planet may just be too premature. But we can still have a sneak peek into what it might actually look like to stand on the surface of the fourth planet from the Sun. Well, almost:

The Wahba Crater, the closest thing to actually standing on the Red Planet (Via 500px. Click to see full size.)

Photographer Dany Eid captured this image of the Wahba Crater in Saudi Arabia. The site is about 250 kilometers from Taif, in the province of Mecca. Originally thought to be formed by a meteorite’s impact, the crater is now understood to have been formed by volcanic activity in the area. The image has a striking resemblance to one of those sent back by the Mars rovers. Wouldn’t you agree?

If you are wondering about the camera settings, here they are: f/2.8, 15 seconds, ISO 500, 20mm. Eid used a Nikon D800 paired with a 14-24mm wide-angle lens.