Small garden under a geodesic dome on Mars

Picture of the Day 20/1/2020 - small patch of grass with a pond and a cabin under geodesic dome on Mars from Instagram profile @blender_every_weekday.

Large human base on Mars by Manchu (Philippe Bouchet)

Picture of the Day 12/1/2020 - lander landing at a large human base on Mars featuring several residential domes & greenhouses, solar array, tall communications antenna, light reconnaissance plane and enclosed landing pad. It's a concept art by French sci-fi artist Manchu (Philippe Bouchet) from French chapter of The Mars Society (Association Planète Mars).

Closeup of the central part of the base:

Painting of Elon Musk on Mars by Conor Walton

Oil painting with Elon Musk, the CEO & lead designer of SpaceX, on Mars by Irish painter Conor Walton. More of his art here.

Tesla Cybertruck at Cybunker on Mars by Lars Büro

Inspired by the recently unveiled Tesla Cybertruck, the New York-based design company Lars Büro has imagined a Cybunker, "a modular architecture that can be deployed as a hi-tech depot or an off-grid residence. Made with a rigid steel monocoque structure, the aerodynamic module is able to withstand the toughest environmental conditions." ... including Mars:

Martian colonies in season 4 of The Expanse

Although Mars is one of the three competing powers in universe of The Expanse TV series (a political sci-fi detective set a few centuries in the future where humans have colonized the entire Solar system) only a few scenes were actually set on Mars in first three seasons of the series. That changes in season 4 where the life on Mars at last gets proper depiction.

In The Expanse Mars, governed by Martian Congressional Republic, is a militaristic and technologically advanced society of over nine billion inhabitants. It is the major competitor of Earth & Luna, governed by United Nations. Earth, dragged down by overpopulation and climate change, envies Mars because of its society's high mobilization towards the shared goal of terraforming Mars. But in season 4 that shared goal and order of the Martian society is starting to erode as the new habitable planets beyond the rings are discovered (without the costly need of being terraformed as Mars does). As the interplanetary military tension is over veterans find themselves needless in the peace time society; crime and corruption is rising, and some even manage to sell older military tech to Belter pirate gangs.

Here is a collection with HD images from the Martian scenes in season 4 of The Expanse (open link in new tab to view in full resolution):

Exterior and interior of a shipyard for Martian fleet:

Martian school kids training for exam:

Mars in Ad Astra (2019) movie

Ad Astra is a recent (September 2019) science fiction thriller set in mid-21st century when humanity has started to settle the inner Solar System. A son (Brad Pitt) is sent on a mission to uncover the truth about his father's (Tommy Lee Jones) long lost mission near Neptune which now threatens the survival of Earth. In his lonesome and dangerous mission he visits several places including a dynamic but wild human colony on the Moon and a desolate relay station on Mars. Here are some HD images from the Martian scenes in the movie.

Poster of Tesla Cybertruck at Schiaparelli Crater on Mars

Poster of Tesla Cybertruck, pressurized edition, near a human base at Schiaparelli Crater on Mars by American video game concept artist Darren Bacon. More of his art here. Note a SpaceX cargo Starship (the 3-legged Tin Tin edition) on launch pad at the base.

Underground Mars colony for 1000 people by InnSpace

A weak ago we posted a concept of Mars colony for 1000 people created by InnSpace team from Poland for Mars Colony Prize contest (held by The Mars Society). In some of the responses there was a critique stressing out the colony should be built underground for better radiation protection. Since then the authors of the concept sent us some additional renderings from which we can conclude it's actually the case - the concept includes most of the buildings being built underground (with only the transparent rooftops sticking out from regolith cover for natural lighting) and interconnected via underground passages.

A hyperloop line entering the colony:

Mars colony for 1000 people by Innspace team (Mars Colony Prize contest)

This year The Mars Society held Mars Colony Prize - a contest for "the best plan for a Mars colony of 1000 people. The colony should be self-supporting to the maximum extent possible - i.e. relying on a minimum mass of imports from Earth. The goal is to have the colony be able to produce all the food, clothing, shelter, power, common consumer products, vehicles, and machines for 1000 people, with only the minimum number of key components, such as advanced electronics needing to be imported from Earth." According to speculations laid out in our Mars Colonization Timeline the first human base on Mars could reach a thousand inhabitants by late 2040s.

The winners of the contest were chosen at the International Mars Society convention in Los Angeles, California in October 2019. Here are images of the Ideacity concept by InnSpace team from Poland which got the 5th place:

Central cluster of the colony:

Factory on Mars by Adam Taylor

Picture of the Day 3/11/2019 - digital drawing of a factory on Mars by American concept artist Adam Taylor. More of his art here.

Orcus Patera base on Mars from Orbiter space flight simulator

Orbiter is a free-to-play space flight simulator developed by a single man Martin Schweiger since 2000 (the last major update was on 2016) and using realistic physics. Originally it's a very bare-bones program, but has a lot of fan-made addons which make the simulator much more enjoyable. One of those addons is Orcus Patera - a fictional human base/spaceport located in Orcus Patera depression on Mars; the addon is developed by Well and DanSteph.

Here are some images of the base modified in New Rome addon (which uses more recent Mars HRSC high-res texture pack and places the base in Valles Marineris):

SpaceX Mars Base Alpha in late 2030s

A few hours ago SpaceX posted on their Flickr account 4K resolution versions of the previously released renders with the new design of Starship. Here is a closeup (open image link in new tab for best resolution) from one of them with Starship launching from Mars Base Alpha. According to our speculated Mars Colonization Timeline the first human base on Mars could be developed to the pictured level by late 2030s.

Colonized Valles Marineris region on Mars from season 4 teaser of The Expanse

There are two short scenes on Mars in the latest season 4 teaser for The Expanse TV series - a political sci-fi detective set a few centuries in the future where humans have colonized the entire Solar system; Mars is one of three competing forces in the universe of The Expanse. There were three more scenes on Mars in the first teaser for season 4.

Human colonies in Valles Marineris region (horizontally flipped in the trailer for some unknown reason) on Mars:

Earth's leader Avasarala attending a diplomatic banquet on Mars:

⇛ HD images of Mars from season 2 of The Expanse TV series here

Incredible miniatures for Total Recall (1990) Martian landscapes

One of the best movies set on Mars ever made - Total Recall (1990), stared by Arnold Schwarzenegger, Rachel Ticotin and Sharon Stone and directed by Paul Verhoeven (known also for Starship Troopers, RoboCop, Basic Instinct and other movies), was the last major movie to heavily utilize miniature effects before computer graphics took that job. Vast and incredibly detailed miniature Martian landscapes were built for the movie. Unfortunately most of the miniatures were destroyed after the filming was done. Here are some rare photos from the production process of the miniature Martian landscapes before their destruction.

Mars colony:

⇩ in movie ⇩

The spaceport:

Human base in a Martian canyon by Colin Geller

Picture of the Day 11/10/2019 - Damaged human base in a Martian canyon - concept art by Colin Geller for "Lazarus labs" exterior in DOOM (2016) computer game.

Family spacecraft approaching Martian spaceport by Clive Almeida

Inspiring scene from our bright future where humanity has colonized the Solar system - family spacecraft approaching Martian spaceport by Indian concept artist Clive Almeida; an image from his concept of a Mars theme park "Mars: a brave new world". More of his art here.

SpaceX Starship launching from Mars Base Alpha

In yesterdays SpaceX's Starship update Elon Musk teased a new concept image of Starship launching from Mars Base Alpha (1st image). The new design of the Starship was also included into an older concept image of Mars Base Alpha and posted on SpaceX's Twitter account (2nd image). Open link in new tab to view image in full resolution.

Boy watching a rocket launch from Mars by Arthur Gore

Picture of the Day 25/9/2019 - young boy watching a SpaceX's Starship-style rocket launching from Mars by Latvian concept artist Arthur Gore. More of his art here.

Future city on terraformed Mars by Julian Faylona

Picture of the Day 19/9/2019 - City consisting of several independent and self-sustaining "hives" on terraformed Mars in a far future by digital artist Julian Faylona. More of his art here.

New cinematic trailer for Occupy Mars simulation game released

The Martian frontier is yours in Occupy Mars - the upcoming (as of today: Coming soon) highly technical open world simulation game about Mars colonization from Polish indie game developer Pyramid Games. In the game you will be able to "build and upgrade your base, discover new amazing regions, conduct mining operations, retrieve water and generate oxygen, grow crops, fix broken parts, learn how to survive on Mars!"

Here is the newest cinematic trailer of the game and beautiful HD images from it. Note the SpaceX's Starman style spacesuit and ITS v2016 Starship.

SpaceX ITS v2016 Starship landing at Mars base:

Assembling Mars base module by module:

Astronaut planting a tree in Mars biodome:

Mars base layout: