In Search of
The
Cydonia Face

Is it or isn't it?

Can we believe ANY of the images when they can so easily be manipulated or enhanced?
All photographs, digital images, reel to reel, video, etc., etc., are products of
light and shadow. Anything else - coloring, cleaning up, enhancement - is playing with
light and shadow - tricks of light and shadow.

Yes, one can achieve clearer, crisper, cleaner images. Yes, one can make fine art.

Yes, one can bring out the details in a photograph, without corrupting the content.
However, that content must be there to begin with.
When one considers the great distance they have traveled to reach us,
the images from Mars are truly incredible.

Here, then is The Face of Cydonia, Mars.

However you look at it - whatever you believe, or do not believe
about it - the latest images of the Cydonia face when compared to the other
Mars Global Surveyor images are a disappointment.

Image Credits Below

- PAGE ONE -

A look at The Face

and Cydonia

3D Analglyphs require red and blue glasses to view them properly

THEN

The Face - from the Viking Image

NOW

Mars Global Surveyor Image
A Grainy Dirty Flat Face

NASA also has fun with light and shadow.
and Compares the Viking Image with the Enhanced New Image - The Last Image is Inverted

The Viking Face Inverted

Inverted
images are like negatives, the values and colors are reversed. The image is Dark where the original was bright and light were the original was dark. Inverted images also play tricks with depth. Highs are low and lows are high. In is out and out is in. Inversion can be useful when trying to decipher features in images such as these high altitude Mars pictures. However, this can be deceptive. Inversion can be very misleading, especially when it is already difficult to see what is going on in a two demsional picture. Looking at these images, one can see how easily one can be fooled if one does not know which of the images is inverted.
When
seeing the new Mars Global Surveyer images for the first time, a friend of mine said, "It looks inverted." Maybe she was right. As I worked on these images I began to wonder. What if an inverted image were presented as a positive image? That would make the inversion of that fake image its negative. That would really foul up an endeaver that already suffers from too much dis/mis/missed/dismissed information and intrigue.

All the Positive and Negative Faces Together


One of the Best Enhancements of the Face Yet
By Steve Wingate of Anomalous Images

This
enhancement by Steve Wingate was made with MaxEnt, a Maximum Entropy Deconvolution process which sharpens and clears up the image. He also did some stretching, adaptive contrasting, adjusted the aspect
ratio and rotated the image 37 degrees right. I probably missed a few things. The image now appears to have more demension than the original from NASA.

View Larger Image

This Image Inverted (small)

Steve's
image is the principal image in this study. I will show it in 3D analglyph form, which is best experienced with 3D red and blue glasses. Because I have used some of the color channels involved in making the 3D analglyphs, some of the other non 3D images that follow seem to become enhanced when viewed with the glasses.

An Enhancement of Steve's Enhancement
View Larger Image

Using
the green channel, - just because I like the looks of the light and shade - I raised the dpi, fooled
around with the brightness and intensity, and embossed it slightly to bring up some of the features. This image does not change or remove any of the features in Steve's MaxEnt image. Playing with the color channels alone does not harm the original image; it merely alters the tonal qualities. I think sometimes when looking at this kind of image, it is really a matter of what one brings to it and how one sees. All adjustments alter perception to some degree.

The Face
looks like a geological playground. Whether it is a rock or a monumental sculpture, one thing is certain. The Face has suffered much erosion. Everyone knows that large eroded outcrops, and even whole mountains, when viewed at certain angles and distances, sometimes look like faces, animals or even complete figures. See The Strange Rocks of the Narrows for an example of this. Can an intelligently carved rock, presumably a hard substance, erode in the same fashion as this structure has? Surely anything is possible over the eons.
If
a monument were carved from this landform, one can make the assumption that it was done in much the same fashion as the Sphinx in Egypt. It is widely believed that the Sphinx was formed out of the available materials, already in place. So it would be possible for a monumental face in Cydonia - unattended and exposed to the elements - to suffer the ravages of geological time.
One
can see in the Sphinx at least two very different kinds of rock - the harder rock of its face, and the softer sedimentary layers of its body. The center, interior, of the Mars face looks as if it is made of a harder substance than the surrounding areas. If this were so, then the center, face portion, would naturally wear away more slowly than the outer surfaces. And of course, if an impact event(s) or explosion were involved in the shaping of what we see now, its appearance and structure would have been drastically altered. The sides of this structure appear like the sides of some mountains on Earth where there have been landslides and/or the softer less stable materials have fallen fallen away.

Still
the mystery remains. There is that nagging matter of the strange symmetry, and the fact that there are no decent images of The Cydonia Face from which to work. Mission to Mars, the latest movie spin -fiction - propaganda - depicts a face beneath tons of Martian deposition. It a good idea; it makes a good story. Hey, it could happen. On Earth the sands of time cover the past quite efficiently. But is that what happened to The Face? In the images that follow I will attempt to explain some of the geological events that might have happened to this landform/face/island/whatever it is/all of the former.

Click on the images to view a larger one. Some images have links to very large files. I recomend openning them in another window.

The Face in 3D

The Face
From MaxEnt Image, Steve Wingate

This is the first 3D analglyph I have selected. It was made from my enhancement of Steve Wingate's MaxEnt image. It is the best one I can come up with thus far. While doing this I have come to realize that working with the Mars face images is difficult. The quality of the original product is just too poor.
This image and the one below give a little more depth to the depressions and recesses of the face landform. And, I hope, will serve well anyone interested in this geological puzzle.
Further on I will show sections of The Face in both regular and analglyph form, and try to decipher them from a geological point of view.
This does not mean that this landform has not been worked into a face - a Marsworks monument so to speak. It means that I am looking at the geology of it. If it is an ancient monument, constructed out of a landform, then what happened to it? If it is just a mountain, than what happened to it?



Second Face
From MaxEnt Image, Steve Wingate

This is another version of the 3D analglyph above - futher enhanced in an attempt to intensify the 3D effect. I do not think it has done that very well. But it is worth a look, as it seems to bring up some of the features, particularly the areas where the lighter materials are. It also serves as an example of how images can be refined - or spoiled as the case my be. It seems to bring out the strange symmetry of his structure better than the one above.
This mysterious symmetry is very visible in the enhancements at the end of this page.








Cydonia and its Face

Cydonia, Mars
NASA Image, F035a72

The Cydonia region is an odd collection of landforms, with many different shapes and sizes. For instance, there are pyramidal mountains, impact craters, flat looking slabs of rock, possible islands, possible shorelines and beach remnants. Except for several pyramidal landforms, nothing seems to look quite like anything else - especially The Face
But on second look, they do. There is a landform to the left and slightly below The Face (A) that seems to have a similar geological structure. That is, having seen other enhanced images of The Face, this structure also appears to have a harder, higher, eroded but less damaged and more stable central core. The sides seem to be falling away in a similar manner as they are on The Face. This landform does not look like something intelligently constructed. It does not look like the light and shadow were playing tricks with it.
At the very bottom right side of this image (B) is what looks like it could have been an island volcano. It also has surrounding features that somewhat resemble The Face.
In order to fully understand the nature of The Face there needs to be a complete study of all the structures near and around it.


Cydonia
-- Another View
NASA Image, F070a13

This second image is lighter. It gives a wider view of the structures nearest The Face. The features of the "island" (B) to the lower right of The Face (next to the large flat rock or mesa) are quite clear, and it is easily seen in relation to The Face. Some of the more subtle features seem washed out, while others are clear. The Face is clear. At the upper left the devastation to one side of the big pyramid (C), and a rocky landscape are very discernable. About the middle of the left side another pyramid (D) is damaged in much the same way, and looks like there is some kind of structure to the inside. I am not going to guess what that might be at this time. However, it does seem mighty coincidental that several of the pyramid shapes are damaged in a very similar manner. In the lower left side (E) is what looks like it could be a chain of small islands.



Cydonia IN 3D
Produced
from NASA Image, F035a72

Cydonia in 3D analglyph. This is not the best 3D image, but it gives one a different perspective of the area.





Cydonia
Through Looking Glass
Produced from NASA Image, F070a13

Just for some fun. This 3D image is in reverse. It seems as if you are looking down through a window. Or a spaceship? Try moving your head from side to side to see the full effect.




A little More Face Enhancement

The two images on the right are simple enhancements of the MaxEnt image from the Anomalous Images web site. CLICK IT to see a larger view. They show what one can do using simple filters and effects from just about any good graphics program such as Photoshop or Corel. They came about by using one of the color channels of the first image. I used red, but it doesn't really matter which one is used. Then I used the Dodge tool. Dodge lightens the areas where it is appplied. Then I converted the image to negative, using a photographic filter - negative NOT invert. Negative is like invert. Converting a color channel image, which is grayscale, into color form will produce a photo negative that is in color, but an invert that is still in grayscale. My negative image resulted in the color seen in the middle image. I then inverted that negative. From these three pictures I produced the second and third picture seen above.
The middle image was made by stitching together the inverted negative, the negative, and the original red channel picture. Its focus is on the light (white) substance on or over the landform. The last image above was made by stitching together the negative, the inverted negative and the original red channel picture - in this order. One can see how the image comes back to itself. But this one seems to fatten up the original MaxEnt image, as well as my enhancement of it. It seems to be all a matter of light and color (which is light) -- light and shadow -- positive and negative. The last image with the help of color, really brings out the shape of this thing, while remaining faithful to Wingate's image.
So what is the white stuff on this face? Is it snow or ice? Just lighter material such as dust, sand or mud? Is it mist or fog? Or could it be any combination, such as rock, ice, and evaporating mist?
Part
Two deals with a closer look at different sections of this intriguing landscape.


Page Two

In Search of the Cydonia Face

-- Image Credits --

Steve Wingate of Anomalous Images and UFO Files