A REAL picture of 243 Ida
Lately I've been helping the local HIIPS team plot the results of their ejecta reaccretion code, written to test theories on the genesis of the large blocks on asteroid 243 Ida, and matching distribution of regolith observed in color variations on Ida's surface. This has led to some interesting projections of the Ida shape model ( Developed by Peter Thomas and Brian Carcich at the Cornell HIIPS site ).
Soon, we'll have detailed information on the work we've done at the LPL Galileo HIIPS page.
First, This is a high resolution mosaic of the real 243 Ida:
This is the spacecraft that did it:
Now, what follows are some examples of the shape model. The orientation of the asteroid and the Sun angle are approximate to what they were at Galileo's closest approach:
I've also generated some MPEGS using the Ida shape model, this Ida movie shows the asteroid rotating, with the viewer's perspective centered at around -50 degrees latitude, and, again, the lighting approximately as it was during Galileo's closest approach.
NOTE: IDL was used to produce these models.
The Galileo Spacecraft
Shape model rendering