A bunch of shows recently have been using some breathtaking high-definition space footage of the Earth. Planet Earth was the first one I noticed, but I’ve since noticed them in Nature’s most amazing events and a bunch of other Discovery/Science/The UFO Channel shows.
These shots are from some sort of high orbit; usually at full pull-out you can see about a third of the Earth’s edge arc.
They seem to be able to get any location in any season, the new Natures Most… ones have been doing a lot of time-lapse shots of things like deserts and the arctic caps. I’m assuming, based on comments in the Planet Earth how-to show, that these are not computer generated, but rather actual space photography.
Anyone know what satellite or set of satellites are getting them? And, if we (taxpayers of Earth) paid for it, whether or not any of those shots/footage are publicly available? Some of those would make phenomenal desktop backgrounds, for example.
Have you downloaded Google Earth? It is not all satellight pictures. Most are aerial photography. But I was able to find my house, see no cars parked in the driveway, and even see my barbeque in the garden.
I also found my car parked at work. Resolution is not great, but you might be surprised. And the pictures might be several years old. But the amount of detail is quite disturbing.
All data from any NASA mission is released to the public at latest one year after it’s collected, and some of it (often including the most spectacular images, for PR value) is released immediately. I don’t know ESA’s policy, but it’s probably similar. So you should be able to get ahold of the images somewhere.
The recently operational GeoEye-1 satellite provides resolution down to about 50cm, which is about the best non-military imaging to date (and will provide data for Google Earth). There are a few images available through the website, though NASA’s Visible Earth and the ESA’s Multimedia Gallery provide a wider source for publicly available material from various instruments. However, as ghardester points out, the more detailed images you’re seeing in these programmes come from aerial photography.
No, I’m not talking about building-and-street aerial photography; these are sweeping shots that show a substantial portion of one side of the planet (one or more continents or oceans), including atmospheric edge, with black space beyond. The NASA site Captain_Awesome linked to (Visible Earth) looks similar; I suspect whatever captured some of those images is the same thing I’m looking for.