
A New Kind of Landscape Photography - coloneltcb
http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2015/12/a-new-kind-of-landscape-photography/421287/?single_page=true
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danso
Has anyone tried using DigitalGlobe (the service that's used in the OP) for
on-demand photography? Their landing page [1] provides several call-to-
actions: download Silverlight to see an interactive demo, set up a live demo,
or regular Contact Us form. They apparently have a partnership with CartoDB
[2], which states that day-of photos can be requested (at $30/km2) and is
integrated to their API -- but then states it's for Enterprise clients only
(though later in the page, says "Anyone can access this data").

I guess there's probably not a service that just lets you fill out an online
form and pay by credit card to get an image on demand, but would like
something a little more frictionless than having to meet with a salesperson
when I already know exactly what I want to try out.

[1] [https://www.digitalglobe.com/products/spatial-on-
demand#feat...](https://www.digitalglobe.com/products/spatial-on-
demand#feature-section)

[2] [https://cartodb.com/cartodb-for/satellite-aerial-
image/](https://cartodb.com/cartodb-for/satellite-aerial-image/)

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habitatforus
We looked into DigitalGlobe a while back. They are the best provider of
satellite imagery we could find, but there are a lot of limitations. First,
you really cannot get on demand imagery. If you wanted the same picture take
every day for months or years. They couldn't do it. Second, the costs were too
high. Even looking at their startup package it felt like we were a small town
band talking to a major record label.

My expectation is that drones will be a much better technology. Unless what
you are interested in is imagery of North Korea, Russia, or some remote area
in Africa in which case pay up and these guys/gals can do it.

~~~
4ad
So, in the end how much does it really cost, and how hard is it to acquire the
service?

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ramdump
That is not Crested Butte - that is Leadville

Source:
[https://www.google.com/maps/@39.2391647,-106.2825792,23874m/...](https://www.google.com/maps/@39.2391647,-106.2825792,23874m/data=!3m1!1e3!5m1!1e4)

~~~
vangale
I was surprised at how easy it was to identify almost everything in the photo
and even then Crested Butte stuck out. Weird mistake to make. The only thing
that stuck out more (for me) was South Park, which I could identify even in
the thumbnail image in the article.

Anyway, completely love the image and would also love to see one pointing a
bit more southerly to capture the Sangre De Cristo's and the Great Sand Dunes.

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stuart78
That picture kind of breaks my sense of perception. When I first looked at it,
I entirely mis-categorized the scale, and thinking it was looking North from
San Bernadino, I was able to place the lakes and landmarks in order for it all
to fit, and it pretty much worked, my mind easing over unrecognized
characteristics as places I'd not been.

Then I read the article.

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bahro
I believe that one of the reasons that it looks strange to us is that the
image is captured using a "push broom scanner," where the satellite captures
one line of the image at a time as it flies above the Earth, so the usual
rules of perspective do not apply. The image is the same geographical width at
the bottom as is it at the top.

~~~
4ad
Also known as isometric projection. Although, because the telescope has a such
a small field of view, perspective projection would give virtually the same
image.

~~~
acjohnson55
Right. It seems like it's essentially an object-space telecentric view
([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telecentric_lens](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telecentric_lens)).

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codingdave
Having hiked, biked, camped, and lived in many of the areas in that photo,
looking at this gives me a deep sense of familiarity, yet still offers a
completely unique perspective. Thanks for sharing this!

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aji
Absolutely breathtaking. It's like standing on an _enormous_ mountain.

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porsupah
One app I noticed recently might be of interest - "SpyMeSat". Give it a
location, and it'll show you a list of forthcoming imaging opportunities from
several satellites. Tap on any of them, and you get to see further information
on its capabilities, including available spatial resolution. I haven't tried
purchasing any images, but the prices look quite sane - £8 for 1 square km,
£15 for 4 sq.km. Whether more interesting angles are available, as in the
article, or just the more familiar "overhead" flat view, I can't tell.

[https://itunes.apple.com/gb/app/spymesat/id691290387?mt=8](https://itunes.apple.com/gb/app/spymesat/id691290387?mt=8)

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KMuncie
Wow, astounding! I want the full-resolution version!

~~~
pp19dd
Think the closest you can get to that is the direct iframe at
[http://www.theatlantic.com/media/interactives/2015/11/colora...](http://www.theatlantic.com/media/interactives/2015/11/colorado-
satellite-photo/index.html?v=1) (leaflet page.)

~~~
sp332
You could download all the images from
[http://www.theatlantic.com//media/interactives/2015/11/color...](http://www.theatlantic.com//media/interactives/2015/11/colorado-
satellite-photo/tiles/TileGroup2/6-0-0.jpg?v=4) to
[http://www.theatlantic.com//media/interactives/2015/11/color...](http://www.theatlantic.com//media/interactives/2015/11/colorado-
satellite-photo/tiles/TileGroup11/6-41-51.jpg?v=4)

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aaronbrethorst
And here I expected this to be an article about New Topographics, given that
the 40th anniversary of the original show just passed:
[http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2010/feb/08/new-
topo...](http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2010/feb/08/new-topographics-
photographs-american-landscapes)

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y04nn
The star positioning system is interesting.

By the way, does anybody know a open source lib like the one they are using
(zoomify) to display very high resolution images on the web?

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niels_olson
That is a large airport.

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roywiggins
I wonder how often spy satellites take similar pictures, since they might be
more willing to play around to peek around cloud cover, if they really want a
particular picture right now.

Having a powerful, private "spy satellite" is really cool, since it puts
government-style capabilities in the hands of "ordinary" people (at least,
ordinary people with money).

