Engineers hope to deploy the mast Wednesday.

"The surface team is pretty excited still," said Watkins. "This is the start of their mission. It's great to keep looking around the neighborhood. My favorite images are those first few images because it gives you an idea of where you are ... This is what a lot of people have been working for five or six years for."

NASA released an image taken by a camera on the Mars rover Curiosity's mast. The image, which was taken with the camera's dust cover still on, is overlayed on a larger image of the landscape. (Image: Courtesy of NASA/JPL)

Sharon Gaudin covers the Internet and Web 2.0, emerging technologies, and desktop and laptop chips for Computerworld. Follow Sharon on Twitter at , on or subscribe to . Her email address is .

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