The oribiter does have some limited capability to see other colors, but can’t distinguish very well between them. That limited capability is used to try to calculate color images when the need arises, as you see in some of the photos, but they are not very color accurate. Many times the choice of color is to make features more distinct, rather than to show what they would look like to the human eye.

And actually, a good example of how false color images can throw people off are are lot of the early Mars photos – which were tinted too heavily red.

Southern New Mexico contains a large white sand desert, which I’d highly recommend to anyone who has never visited!