Curiosity is quite the amateur photographer and doesn't waste an opportunity for a shoot

Nov 8, 2012 20:31 GMT  ·  By

Curiosity is staying busy on Mars. It's done with its second soil analysis with CheMin, it's getting ready for its fifth scoop from which samples will be analyzed by CheMin and, for the first time, by the SAM instrument.

Between all that, it still manages to find time to snap photos of itself and its surroundings.

NASA put together a spectacular and incredibly detailed self-portrait from imagery shot on Sol 84, October 31.

It showed the rover in great detail, but also offered a glance at the breathtaking (and not just because of the lack of atmosphere) landscape around it.

The image was stitched together from several detailed but zoomed-in shots.

On the next day, Curiosity continued to take detailed shots of its surroundings and, while there's no "official" NASA panoramic view, the raw images are available to anyone interested in them.

Ken Kremer over at Universe Today grabbed some of those raw images and created an even better view of Mount Sharp and the landscape behind Curiosity, though the image is of lower detail than last week's monster.