Soviet lander on Phobos by Maciej Rebisz

Picture of the Day 30/5/16 - Soviet lander on Phobos by Polish sci-fi artist Maciej Rebisz. More of his art here and here.

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Female astronaut on Mars by Mark Kent

Picture of the Day 17/4/16 - Female astronaut or "A new day on Mars" by sci-fi artist Mark Kent. More of his art here.

Video: NASA's Journey to Mars

In recent months NASA has released some exciting videos visualizing its "Journey to Mars". What is more important - they represent a conceptual shift from Apollo's style approach [every expedition to it's own location] to a more longsighted approach - every expedition to the same one location. At the workshop in October, 2015 NASA officials revealed that "human exploration of Mars is not planned as a single mission, but a series of three to five expeditions, each with a crew of four to six, lasting about 500 Martian days each. All would land in the same exploration zone, or EZ. The plan includes the construction of a surface field station to be located in the center of the exploration." It means that NASA's "Journey to Mars" mission concept has become more friendly to a goal of a permanent human colony on Mars.

NASA's base on Mars after a few decades:

Astronauts on Phobos by Ron Miller

Picture of the Day 12/2/16 - Astronauts on Phobos by sci-fi illustrator and writer Ron Miller. More of his Mars art here.

Concept art for The Martian movie

The official Facebook page of The Martian has posted some concept art pictures for the movie. Here they are (click for original resolution):

Concept art for The Martian by Oleg Zherebin

Picture of the Day 30/10/2015 - Mark Watney, his rover and the Sojourner rover as a concept art for The Martian by Oleg Zherebin. More of his art here.

Concept art for The Martian by Artur Sadlos

Picture of the Day 6/10/2015 - Sandstorm over a Mars base as a concept art for The Martian by Artur Sadlos.

Mars rover by Florent Lebrun

Picture of the Day 22/9/2015 - Rover in a Martian canyon by Canadian fantasy artist Florent Lebrun. More of his art here.

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Mars movie review - Red Planet (2000)

In the time we all are waiting for the upcoming sci-fi blockbuster The Martian I decided to watch again and review Red Planet (2000) - a sci-fi movie stared by Val Kilmer and Carrie-Anne Moss with quite similar plot (astronauts trying to survive and get off Mars) as the The Martian but undeservedly low scored by the most critics.

Story

In the first part of 21st century humans have totally polluted Earth and now are remotely trying to terraform Mars to make it a second home for humanity. For 20 years everything seems to be going according to the plan - temperatures on Mars has been raised and dispatched algae has been starting to cover more and more of the planet introducing oxygen in its atmosphere. Suddenly all the algae vanishes and there is no other way but to send a manned mission to find out - why this is happening.

It is year 2056 and a crew of 6 is being sent to Mars aboard the "Mars-1" in the first manned mission to Mars. When they reach the orbit of Mars their ship is struck by a particle burst from an unexpectedly powerful Solar flare. In result the electronics of Mars-1 is fried and fire is spreading through all the ship. 5 of 6 crew members eject the ship with landing module but the only female - ship's captain Bowman (Carrie-Anne Moss) - stays on Mars-1 to save the ship.

Mars lander over Valles Marineris by William Black

Picture of the Day 12/9/15 - A spacecraft entering Mars atmosphere over Valles Marineris by William Black.
More of his space concept art here.

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Terraformed Mars by Ville Ericsson

Picture of the Day 29/8/15 - A shuttle flying over terraformed Mars by Swedish concept artist Ville Ericsson. More of his fantasy art here.

Mars glider by David A. Hardy

Picture of the Day 6/6/15 - A solar powered glider flying over a Mars canyon by classical space artist David A. Hardy.
More of his Mars art here.

Mars outpost by Robert McCall

Picture of the Day 4/5/15 - "Mars outpost" by legendary space artist Robert McCall.

Take off from Mars by Pat Rawlings

Picture of the Day 25/4/15 - Spaceship taking off from Mars (1990) by space illustrator Pat Rawlings. His description about this drawing you can read here.

View from Mars orbit by Ludovic Celle

Picture of the Day 14/4/15 - View from the window of spaceship in Mars orbit by French graphic artist Ludovic Celle.
More of his Mars art here.

Mars explorer by Erik van Helvoirt

Picture of the Day 21/3/15 - Mars exploration rover by Erik van Helvoirt from Netherlands. More of his concept art here.

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Mars explorer by Dmitry Kolomeets

Picture of the Day 6/3/15 - Mars exploration rover (2014) by freelance digital artist Dmitry Kolomeets (Dimk). More of his art here.

Spaceship in Mars orbit by Tim Flattery

Picture of the Day 23/2/15 - Spaceship in Mars orbit by Tim Flattery from his concept art for Mission to Mars. More of his concept art for movies here.

Astronauts exploring Mars by Manchu

Picture of the Day 14/2/15 - "Sunrise on Mars polar cap" by French sci-fi artist Manchu (Philippe Bouchet).

Red Mars, Green Mars and Blue Mars by Peter Elson

A set of paintings for the book covers of Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars trilogy by classical space illustrator Peter Elson.
More of his paintings you can find here.

Phase 1. - Red Mars:

Phase 2. - Green Mars:

Phase 3. - Blue Mars: