Dynamic shadow USGS map

Why would I want to re-shade the USGS texture map?!

Just like the Clementine imagery, the major shortcoming of the USGS map is that it has constant illumination. While the Clementine imagery is for high solar angles (more than 45 degrees from the terminator), the USGS map is designed to have solar illumination coming from the right, which suits evening observers well. But as most observers know, craters typically disappear at full phase, and then display reversed lighting after that.

You can choose to have Lunar Calculator try and mimic this behaviour in the Settings menu:

In the example below, the prominent craters are Endymion, Atlas and Hercules:

Waxing crescent Full Moon Waning gibbous

The views are not identical because of libration! The full Moon view is librated towards the limb.

Here's the real thing from the Consolidated Lunar Atlas:
Waxing crescent Full Moon Waning gibbous

It's not perfect - it's not going to be without having the folks at USGS create a texture map for full Moon (solar noon) and solar afternoon illumination, but it's much better than constant illumination with incorrect shadows.

This extra refinement does extoll a tax on the speed of the rendering, but it's well worth it.

Peaks and crater rims on the "dark side"



When the dynamic shadow is turned on, Lunar Calculator provides an estimate as to which features on the "dark side" of the terminator might be sunlit. Given the limited information available and the limited computing time needed to "do this right", this is not going to be accurate, but again, it's more realistic than nothing at all. Think of it as a first in selenographic simulation available to the amateur.

A complete simulation would require a very high resolution digital database of terrain elevation, which doesn't yet exist.

Better yet: a Clementine-USGS blend

As you can see in the real-life images, craters are only prominent towards the terminator. Features near the sunlit limb at first quarter behave more like a full Moon illumination. Lunar Calculator takes care of this with a Clementine-USGS blend.

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USGS-Clementine Blend