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Most Detailed Image Of Earth Yet

Posted by Hemos on from the lookin'-purty dept.

TomDM writes "BBC News has a story on how scientists created the most accurate and detailed image of our planet yet, composing the image from satellite data, and adjusting it for the correct colours. "

9 of 285 comments (clear)

  1. Links to actual pictures by willybur · · Score: 5, Informative

    Look at the NASA MODIS site here if you want to actually see the pictures...

    --

    --
    "Everybody wants a rock to wind a piece of string around." - They Might Be Giants, "We Want a Rock"
  2. High Res Links by mr_gerbik · · Score: 5, Informative

    Nasa has some High Res versions here.

    Yes.. you too can download a 410MB TIFF of the earth ;)

  3. Karma Whoring by bigdreamer · · Score: 5, Informative

    This goes to the directory of the newest images.

  4. works great in xplanet by Alan · · Score: 4, Informative

    Anyone who wants to use this for xplanet (a very cool globe program for *nix) can. There's a nice 2400x1200 version floating around somewhere, that combined with Hans Ecke's scripts, will create just awsome images for your desktop.

  5. Re:Where? by tap · · Score: 4, Informative
    You have download for free a 30 second resolution digital elevation for the whole planet from the USGS. It's called GTOPO30 and it's been avialable since 1996.

    As to why more isn't avialable for free, it costs money to create data like this. One way or another, someone needs to pay for it. If taxes aren't enough to provide hi-res images of the entire world, then that leaves private enterprise.

  6. "Last one out, turn off the light" by xueexueg · · Score: 2, Informative
    That's the caption on the last image on the story, a composite of the earth at night. I've always been a little creeped out by those images of a lighted-up Earth skeleton; I mean, it's neat to see the Megalopoleis of the world, and the way that all these tiny, weak lights come together to make brighter lights, visible from space.

    But it's also incredibly apocalyptic, to me.

    If my little 75-watt porch light contributes to light pollution enough to be visible from space, it really makes tangible the effect of the other kinds of pollution that that light must create. A tiny bit of coal here, a puff of gas there; without my (or anyone else's) thinking about it, it turns into something that's fucking visible from space.

    So when the caption is "Last one out, turn off the light", all that does is drive home for me how even the tiniest decisions I make -- leaving the porch light on all night so robbers can't steal my luxuries -- affect the whole world.

    Blimey, we're all killing eachother: cheerio, last one out, be a dear, turn off the light, eh?

  7. Re:Where? by craw · · Score: 1, Informative

    Go to NOAA NGDC topographic/bathymetric web site. There is a bunch of data and images that you can download. There are even some software.

    In case you don't know, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Admininstration, National Geophysical Data Center.

  8. To Get Your own High Quality Copy by BlackGriffen · · Score: 2, Informative

    go to This web site [http://visibleearth.nasa.gov/]. They make excellent desktop pictures! BlackGriffen Basking in the glow of the karma whoring light... :D

  9. Re:Where? by adamp3 · · Score: 3, Informative

    All the data, seperated into hemispheres and at 1 pixel = 1 km resolution (21600x21600 pixel images) is freely available from NASA at:

    ftp://gloria2-f.gsfc.nasa.gov/pub/stockli/

    The images are split into versions with or without shaded topography and bathymetry, there's an ice cap map, a landcover map, topography/bathymetry maps, a cloud layer, and the city lights image.

    They're in RAW format ("Open As.." in Photoshop).
    Be prepared to wait a while for them to open.