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I love these guys! I helped advise them on their crowdfunding campaign a few years ago. One of my favorite projects. Hey Topher! Are you guys cross checking th

by ada1981 9y ago

I love these guys! I helped advise them on their crowdfunding campaign a few years ago. One of my favorite projects. Hey Topher! Are you guys cross checking this with daily satellite imagery? I met with a guy who's company gets a full HD shot of the earth every 24 hours and they'd be happy to give you guys access to the visual data (they also train algorithms on it to detect all sorts of activity). Anyhow, I'll shoot you an email.

bourhan-rfcx 9y ago
Thank you so much for you support! We are not doing that at the moment but would love to hear more about it.
pr0tonic 9y ago
What company is this if you dont mind saying?
- zapfranklin 9y ago
  I assume he is talking about Planet Labs (https://www.planet.com/ https://www.planet.com/) - a very cool service.
  - ada1981 9y ago
    Yes, this is it as far as I can tell.
  - XR0CSWV3h3kZWg 9y ago
    Do you happen to know what the pricing looks like?
    - notahacker 9y ago
      Representative pricing for multiple sources including Planet's RapidEye: http://www.landinfo.com/satellite-imagery-pricing.html http://www.landinfo.com/satellite-imagery-pricing.html Purchasing a before and after image of a specific logging site isn't cheap once you've factored in minimum order sizes, but it isn't unaffordable. Purchasing images to look at deforestation on a national scale (if you're looking at individual trees, not woods; open data will give you the latter) is millions of dollars per annum, but worked very well where tried to prevent illegal vegetation clearing in Australia.
- tony_cannistra 9y ago
  My guess is likely Planet. https://www.planet.com/products/ https://www.planet.com/products/
aerique 9y ago
Do the shots include oceans and seas as well and would ships be visible on those shots? I'm asking because Sea Shepherd could not continue an anti-whaling campaign because they were technologically overmatched: http://www.themercury.com.au/news/politics/sea-shepherd-announces-southern-ocean-ceasefire-citing-inability-to-match-military-might-backing-japanese-whaling-fleet/news-story/68986381d9ff802f7e2012ec4ff11b68 http://www.themercury.com.au/news/politics/sea-shepherd-anno...
- ada1981 9y ago
  I can ask, but I assume so. The guy I spoke with was doing things like algorthmically measuring shadow angles on crude oil storage tank covers to determine supply stocks and then selling that data to commodities traders. They were able to get incredible detail along with really robust processing of huge datasets.
- tony_cannistra 9y ago
  Planet does not image the ocean in its entirety due to the difficulty in geo-referencing (pre-user imagery processing pipelines use ground control points, usually just shiny objects with a known location, to locate the image on the earth, and this is hard in the ocean), but they do image focal regions for purposes similar to those you mention (vessel identification + tracking). I'd also imagine this choice has something to do with preserving satellite operational lifespan (can turn cameras off when not being used). https://www.planet.com/products/open-water-monitoring/ https://www.planet.com/products/open-water-monitoring/
Kagerjay 9y ago
Doesn't NASA have a dedicated satellite with API access for this type of data? (Monitoring weather, tracking deforestation, crop changes, etc). I believe its called VIIRS I recall seeing it on mark robers "is nasa a waste of money" video here. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lARpY0nIQx0&vl=en https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lARpY0nIQx0&vl=en Does planet.com use that data or the company you have in mind use it?
- ada1981 9y ago
  They have an array of their own satellites that circle the earth and get an aggregate photo of the entire planet about once every 24 hours.
therealdrag0 9y ago
NPR's "Planet Money" podcast did an interesting series about satellites which featured this company, "Planet". https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2017/12/01/567267573/planet-money-goes-to-space https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2017/12/01/567267573/plan...

bourhan-rfcx 9y ago

Thank you so much for you support! We are not doing that at the moment but would love to hear more about it.

pr0tonic 9y ago

What company is this if you dont mind saying?

zapfranklin 9y ago
I assume he is talking about Planet Labs (https://www.planet.com/ https://www.planet.com/) - a very cool service.
- ada1981 9y ago
  Yes, this is it as far as I can tell.
- XR0CSWV3h3kZWg 9y ago
  Do you happen to know what the pricing looks like?
  - notahacker 9y ago
    Representative pricing for multiple sources including Planet's RapidEye: http://www.landinfo.com/satellite-imagery-pricing.html http://www.landinfo.com/satellite-imagery-pricing.html Purchasing a before and after image of a specific logging site isn't cheap once you've factored in minimum order sizes, but it isn't unaffordable. Purchasing images to look at deforestation on a national scale (if you're looking at individual trees, not woods; open data will give you the latter) is millions of dollars per annum, but worked very well where tried to prevent illegal vegetation clearing in Australia.
tony_cannistra 9y ago
My guess is likely Planet. https://www.planet.com/products/ https://www.planet.com/products/

aerique 9y ago

Do the shots include oceans and seas as well and would ships be visible on those shots? I'm asking because Sea Shepherd could not continue an anti-whaling campaign because they were technologically overmatched: http://www.themercury.com.au/news/politics/sea-shepherd-announces-southern-ocean-ceasefire-citing-inability-to-match-military-might-backing-japanese-whaling-fleet/news-story/68986381d9ff802f7e2012ec4ff11b68 http://www.themercury.com.au/news/politics/sea-shepherd-anno...

ada1981 9y ago
I can ask, but I assume so. The guy I spoke with was doing things like algorthmically measuring shadow angles on crude oil storage tank covers to determine supply stocks and then selling that data to commodities traders. They were able to get incredible detail along with really robust processing of huge datasets.
tony_cannistra 9y ago
Planet does not image the ocean in its entirety due to the difficulty in geo-referencing (pre-user imagery processing pipelines use ground control points, usually just shiny objects with a known location, to locate the image on the earth, and this is hard in the ocean), but they do image focal regions for purposes similar to those you mention (vessel identification + tracking). I'd also imagine this choice has something to do with preserving satellite operational lifespan (can turn cameras off when not being used). https://www.planet.com/products/open-water-monitoring/ https://www.planet.com/products/open-water-monitoring/

Kagerjay 9y ago

Doesn't NASA have a dedicated satellite with API access for this type of data? (Monitoring weather, tracking deforestation, crop changes, etc). I believe its called VIIRS I recall seeing it on mark robers "is nasa a waste of money" video here. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lARpY0nIQx0&vl=en https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lARpY0nIQx0&vl=en Does planet.com use that data or the company you have in mind use it?

ada1981 9y ago
They have an array of their own satellites that circle the earth and get an aggregate photo of the entire planet about once every 24 hours.

therealdrag0 9y ago

NPR's "Planet Money" podcast did an interesting series about satellites which featured this company, "Planet". https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2017/12/01/567267573/planet-money-goes-to-space https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2017/12/01/567267573/plan...