I was for some reason completely unaware of this possibility. How much would comissioning such a clip cost, and whats the delay? I looked through the website but couldn't seem to find concrete info. I am surprised that the media isn't using this, like they have taken to using satellite imagery on news shows now. They could show moving imagery of troop movements on the Crimea right now? That seems like it would have a huge impact...
Planes Landing in Beijing: Video from Space
31–40 of 72 posts
Re: Planes Landing in Beijing: Video from Space
#32They seem to be careful not to show a large object like a plane crossing the "seams" that appear in the video (similar to the seams in satellite imagery on maps where they've patched together data from multiple passes / satellites). When you see the cars on the freeway they seem to disappear at the seams. Does the camera have to be focused on an area the size of the blocks they show? This is still very impressive - I…
The video field of view is 1.1 by 2 km: http://skybox.com/uploads/10/08/imageryandvideospecsheet.pdf
Purely speculating, not going on anything they’ve said: theoretically when they have more satellites you might be able to patch together a larger area with simultaneous video from several birds. You’d have a slightly ugly angle difference at the seam, of course. There may be technical constraints here that I’m not thinking of, though.
In any case, at 1 m GSD and 30 fps, 1.1 by 2 km is 66 megapixels a second. Even efficiently compressed, that’s a lot of information already.
Re: Planes Landing in Beijing: Video from Space
#33I am more amazed at the lack of smog blocking visibility. Disclaimer: I'm Chinese and I love Beijing as a city, on a good day it's about as clean as LA and on a bad day its...well you can barely see airport terminal when you land.
In LA at least, smog goes to about 5000ft to the inversion layer. Looking vertically through that distance you get much better visibility vs looking horizontally through miles of smog. You can notice the effect looking out a plane window at cruise altitude compared to landing and takeoff.
and: "west la" != "central la"
Re: Planes Landing in Beijing: Video from Space
#34[deleted]
Re: Planes Landing in Beijing: Video from Space
#35Those guys have done a TED talk about designing and launching their lightweight satellites.
http://www.ted.com/talks/dan_berkenstock_the_world_is_one_bi...
Re: Planes Landing in Beijing: Video from Space
#36They seem to be careful not to show a large object like a plane crossing the "seams" that appear in the video (similar to the seams in satellite imagery on maps where they've patched together data from multiple passes / satellites). When you see the cars on the freeway they seem to disappear at the seams. Does the camera have to be focused on an area the size of the blocks they show? This is still very impressive - I…
The video field of view is 1.1 by 2 km: http://skybox.com/uploads/10/08/imageryandvideospecsheet.pdf Purely speculating, not going on anything they’ve said: theoretically when they have more satellites you might be able to patch together a larger area with simultaneous video from several birds. You’d have a slightly ugly angle difference at the seam, of course. There may be technical constraints here that I’m not thi…
[deleted]
Re: Planes Landing in Beijing: Video from Space
#37Earlier quoted context omitted.
The first link you provided also brings up several interesting implications about continuous surveillance from space. The first is that it is technically possible, but economically difficult. Getting ~5000 high resolution satellites in LEO is not really all that much more difficult than getting 1, it's a matter of scale. But getting funding to put that number up is virtually impossible. Even smallsats and other swarm…
Bandwidth issues are alleviated by directional antennae, right?
Re: Planes Landing in Beijing: Video from Space
#38Earlier quoted context omitted.
Not sure if troll. The answer is no. 5-6 inch resolution means that one pixel will represent 5-6 inches. You wouldn't even be able to see the phone. Edit: Sorry, understood your comment now. The real problem isn't resolution, it's "getting a good angle". Unless your target and the satellite's orbit are magically aligned at a precise moment, you're going to have an extremely hard time getting a satellite into position…
Parent knows this, and was asking what could be done with modern hardware, given that keyhole-class satellites have been up for 30 years.
As long as the laws of physics allow it, its possible.
Re: Planes Landing in Beijing: Video from Space
#39They seem to be careful not to show a large object like a plane crossing the "seams" that appear in the video (similar to the seams in satellite imagery on maps where they've patched together data from multiple passes / satellites). When you see the cars on the freeway they seem to disappear at the seams. Does the camera have to be focused on an area the size of the blocks they show? This is still very impressive - I…
It seems like the part of the image showing the video is surrounded by pictures (not video). It seems everything is video because he is moving the image around just at the right time.
A cool technology enanced with a cool trick.
Re: Planes Landing in Beijing: Video from Space
#40Earlier quoted context omitted.
Not sure if troll. The answer is no. 5-6 inch resolution means that one pixel will represent 5-6 inches. You wouldn't even be able to see the phone. Edit: Sorry, understood your comment now. The real problem isn't resolution, it's "getting a good angle". Unless your target and the satellite's orbit are magically aligned at a precise moment, you're going to have an extremely hard time getting a satellite into position…
Parent knows this, and was asking what could be done with modern hardware, given that keyhole-class satellites have been up for 30 years.
Optical resolution doesn't follow Moore's law. There will certainly have been improvements, but not like we are accustomed to. Computers can be used to model the atmosphere and attempt to recover resolution, but the returns will diminish quickly.