On Fri, Oct 20, 2006 at 04:21:31PM -0400, Robert G. Brown wrote: ... ... > geosync on Earth, and if the military and weather programs have given us > nothing else, they've given us simply gangbusters orbital cameras. I > mean who on this list hasn't gone on Google Earth yet? Through EARTH's > atmosphere and from EARTH orbit you can see my house here: > > 35^\circ 59' 17.10"N > 78^\circ 58' 50.22"W > > At 512 feet you can clearly make out my Ford Excursion in the driveway, > see the row of cypruses along the back, see the white table on my back > deck that is about 4' across, see an azalea bush out front (next to the > sidewalk) that is about 1.5' across. And this isn't the world's best > camera or as high resolution as they could manage, even through Earth's > soupy atmosphere.
Mmm... Except... The high res images are from a plane because you can't really make out the fine details from a satellite through the earth's atmosphere. If you look closely at the houses or trees, you will see that the imagery at the fine detail level is very far from orthographic. Some trees and houses are clearly photographed from their southern side, some from the northern. For example, your house has a visible north-western side, while your south-eastern neighbor has a visible south-eastern side on his house. The combination of the two images (from two different passes of the plane) is seamless, but the change of perspective is very noticable once you notice :) -- / jakob _______________________________________________ Beowulf mailing list, [email protected] To change your subscription (digest mode or unsubscribe) visit http://www.beowulf.org/mailman/listinfo/beowulf
