The excitement surrounding space exploration is often hushed, particularly when grainy photos are the order of the day. Thankfully however, that isn't the case  as the first pictures roll in from the Mars Orbiter. The images are all in high resolution, thanks to the high resolution imaging equipment onboard NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, known as HiRISE.

Images came in this morning much to the delight of those on the ground, waiting to see if the images would be of the high resolution they'd hoped, they weren't disappointed. The images are said to be sharp and clear and were taken late Thursday for NASA to process them. The images show things never before seen with amazing detail. Given Mars is a staggering 145 million miles away, this is some achievement.