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Artbound

The First Picture of Mars was Drawn in Crayon

It’s no surprise that the first view of Mars was made by scientists at the Jet Propulsion Lab (JPL) in Pasadena, California. But did you know that the very first image of the red planet was made with pastel crayons? As data came back from a satellite as it flew relatively near Mars, scientists translated the grayscale image data into a paint-by-number illustration.

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