Level 2 Help for MARSTIEXYZ

INP

Input stereo pair.


NAVTABLE

Corrected navigation filename.
If marsnav was run on the input images it created a table of corrected
pointing parameters. If you refer to this table using NAVTABLE it
will override the pointing parameters (e.g. azimuth and elevation) in the
picture labels, giving different (and presumably better) output coordinates.


CONFIG_PATH

A colon-separated list of directories in which to look for configuration
and calibration files.  Environment variables are allowed in the list
(and may themselves contain colon-separated lists).  The directories are
searched in order for each config/cal file when it is loaded.  This allows
multiple projectes to be supported simultaneously, and allows the user to
override any given config/cal file.  Note that the directory structure below
the directories specified in this path must match what the project expects.
For example, Mars 98 expects flat fields to be in a subdirectory named
"flat_fields" while Mars Pathfinder expects them to be directly in the
directory specified by the path (i.e. no intermediate subdirectories).


RSF

Rover State File.  This is a list of filenames to load containing
Rover State information.  These files contain position and orientation
information for a rover (or other mobile spacecraft) at various sites.
They are in XML format.  See the "Rover Motion Counter (RMC) Master File SIS"
for details on these files.

Rover State Files have a priority order.  The files listed first have
the highest priority.

Environment variables may be used in the list.

For MER, if a directory is specified, then that directory is searched for
RMC Master files and any found are loaded.  The directory structure and
filename convention is covered in the RMC SIS.  The directory specified
is the one containing "master", so if <dir> is the name specified in the
RSF parameter, the following files will be searched for:

<dir>/master/_Master.svf
<dir>/master/_Site__Master.rvf

The name of each file loaded is printed to the stdout log for reference.


DEBUG_RSF

If enabled, this causes the internal database of RMC locations to be
printed out to the stdout log.  This is after the RSF files have been
loaded and the coordinate systems read from the input label(s).


COORD

This parameter is ignored by marstiexyz.  The parameter exists for
compatibility with subroutines used by other programs (see e.g. marsmap).


COORD_INDEX

This parameter is ignored by marstiexyz.  The parameter exists for
compatibility with subroutines used by other programs (see e.g. marsmap).


FIXED_SITE

This parameter is ignored by marstiexyz.  The parameter exists for
compatibility with subroutines used by other programs (see e.g. marsmap).


SOLUTION_ID

Specifies which solution ID to use for pointng corrections.

There are potentially many different definitions for the same coordinate
system. These are identified via a unique Solution ID.  If this parameter
is given, only the specified solution's definition is searched for.


POINT_METHOD

Specifies a mission-specific pointing method to use.  Normally this
parameter is not used, in which case the "default" pointing methods
are used.  Some missions may have special, or alternate, pointing
methods available, which are indicated by this string (for example,
backlash models, using arm joint angles instead of x/y/z/az/el, etc).
A substring search is used, so multiple methods (where that makes sense)
can be specified by separating the keywords with commas.

Note that nav files created using one pointing method will most likely
not be compatible with a mosaic created using a different pointing method.

The methods available vary per mission, but some methods available at
the time of this writing are:

BACKLASH : Mars 98 SSI only.  Selects a backlash pointing model,
which adjusts the telemetered azimuth and elevation values based on
knowledge of the camera's mechanical backlash and the direction the
motor was travelling when the image was taken.


MATCH_METHOD

Specifies a method for pointing corrections.

Loose method matches with pointing parameters of the image.
Tight method matches with unique id of the image.


MATCH_TOL

Tolerance value for matching pointing parameters in the pointing corrections
file.  Used if MATCH_METHOD=LOOSE
Default value is pretty arbitrary, though seems to work well so far....


NOSITE

Disables all label-derived parameters to the Site mechanism which underlies
coordinate systems.  This forces all sites to be identical, with all rotations
and offsets set the same.  In the case of MPF or Mars 98, this disables
the lander quaternion and offset (sets them to identity and 0, respectively).
This option should not be used with images taken from different vantage
points (e.g. the spacecraft moved, or mixing a lander and a rover) or
invalid results will be obtained.  The use of this option invalidates the
Fixed coordinate frame; any values reported in the Fixed frame will not
correctly reflect the orientation of the lander/rover.

Obviously, this option should be rarely used; it is intended for when the
image labels defining the site are invalid or inconsistent.


NORMAL

The local mars surface normal vector coordinate system specified by SURF_COORD 
parameter (defaults to surface fixed).
For most pan/tilt cameras, if the lander is not tilted this vector
would be: normal=(0,0,-1).  ie: x_component=0, y_component=0, z_component=-1.
This need not be a unit vector.  This vector is used to define the
surface plane to which image points are projected in order to minimize
parallax.
For SPHERE1/2 surface models, normal's first parameter is used to
denote sphere's radius.  Thus to describe sphere of radius R, user
would specify normal=(R, 0, 0).


GROUND

Any point on the surface, in coordinate system specified by SURF_COORD parameter
(defaults to surface fixed).  This defines where the tilted plane is in space.  
Although any point may be used, normally the point just "under" the origin is selected.
Defaults:
Mars Pathfinder:  (0.0, 0.0, 0.0)       (lander zero point is on the ground)
Mars 98 Lander:   (0.0, 0.0, 1.64)      (lander zero point is on top of deck)
MER           :   (0.0, 0.0, 0.294)
For MER images taken on top of the lander, the ground is roughly at (0.0, 0.0, 0.7)
For SPHERE1/2 surface models, GROUND parameter is used to denote sphere's
center.  
    


SURF_COORD

The coordinate system that surface parameters like GROUND and NORMAL are defined in.
For valid values refer to COORD parameter description.  The interpretation of the 
values is dependent on the mission. Defaults to surface fixed coordinate system.
Note that no validation is done for input strings because COORD is using the same
values.  So user needs to be extra careful in specifying SURF_COORD value.  For 
example COORD=local would be correctly interpreted to mean LOCAL_LEVEL because of
validation process.  On the other hand specifying SURF_COORD=local would lead
to underlying code treating the input value as invalid and reverting to default
which is FIXED frame.  So the values for SURF_COORD should be spelled exactly as
found in the list of valid values for COORD parameter.    


SURFACE

The type of mars surface to use. The surface is used to intercept view rays
emanating from the cameras in order to model out parallax between the
stereo cameras. The options are surface=INFINITY which means no surface
is used, surface=PLANE (the default case). If surface = PLANE then the plane
is defined by the NORMAL and GROUND parameters.  For the cases when PLANE 
doesn't match local topography sufficiently well, here are two sphere surface
models: surface=SPHERE1 and surface=SPHERE2.  SPHERE1 is useful to model
convex surfaces like hills, it returns closest(first) ray-surface intersection 
point.  SPHERE2 is useful to model concave surfaces, like crater when the
camera point is outside looking in, it returns farthest(second) ray-surface 
intersection point.  For the case when camera is inside the sphere surface, 
like rover sitting in the crater, there is only a single intersection point
and SPHERE1 and SPHERE2 behave exactly the same.


TIEPOINTS

Input tiepoint file for tiepoint visualization.  Only used if TIE_TYPE
is turned on.  Both the old (text) and new (XML) tiepoint file formats
are supported, and the format is auto-detected.


TIE_TYPE

Allows tiepoints to be visualized by plotting them on top of a mosaic.
Should never be used for production mosaics; this is intended to help
determine if tiepoints (such as from MARSAUTOTIE) are any good.

The default value, NO_TIES, turns off tiepoint visualization completely.

POINTS turns on point mode.  The left side of the tiepoint is indicated
by a dot (single pixel) on the image at the location that point projects to.
The value of the pixel is TIE_DN plus 10 times the difference (in mosaic
space) between the left and right parts of the tiepoint.  This gives some
indication of how well the tiepoint was corrected.  Thus if TIE_DN is 7000,
a value of 7032 indicates that the tiepoints were 3.2 pixels apart.  Of
course, a difference of 0 (dn=7000 for this example) means that the tiepoint
was corrected perfectly.

FLAG does what POINTS does, but then draws an additional vector on the
image (at half the intensity of the point).  This vector starts at the point
and continues for 10 pixels parallel to a line between the centers of the
"left" and "right" images for that tiepoint.  Thus it provides some indication
of which pair of images was involved in the tiepoint, when there are multiple
overlapping images.  Note that the edge of the mosaic is not considered; if
the image centers are on opposite ends of the mosaic (as in, the edge of the
mosaic splits the centers), the vector will use the actual centers, without
being adjusted for wrapping.

VECTOR does what POINTS does, but then draws an additional vector on the
image (at half the intensity of the point).  This vector starts at the point
and continues in the direction of the right-side tiepoint.  The length of the
vector is 10 times the difference between the left and right (same as the
intensity of the point itself).  This makes it easy to visualize tiepoint
outliers.

Tiepoint visualization is especially effective when combined with -NUMBER and
-OVER (overlapping footprints).  The -FLAG or -VECTOR modes should almost
always be used; POINT alone has not proved to be useful.


TIE_DN

DN value to use for tiepoint visualization.  See TIE_TYPE.