WELCOME to this Tutorial, a training manual for learning the role of space science and technology for using remote sensing to monitor planetary bodies and distant stars and galaxies. The Earth itself will be the main focus. The Tutorial initially was sponsored by the Applied Information Science Branch (Code 935) ... at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, and more recently has been underwritten by the Air Force Academy. As you work through these pages, you will see how we apply remote sensing (a term defined at the beginning of the Introduction Section) to studying the land, sea, air and biotic communities that comprise our planet's environments, as well as obtainig a deep understanding of the vital role it plays in exploring the planets and reaching the stars and galaxies well out into the Cosmos. Not only will you gain insight into past uses of aerial photography and space imagery, but you should develop skills in interpreting these visual displays and data sets by direct in spection and by computer processing. You will even be able to apply your newly acquired knowledge to actually doing image interpretation using a processing program called PIT on "raw" image data that together come with this CD-ROM or can be downloaded from the Internet version.
The central aim, then, of The Remote Sensing Tutorial is to familiarize, and in so doing instruct, you as to what remote sensing is, what its applications are, and what you need to know in order to interpret and, hopefully, use the data/information being acquired by satellite, air, and ground sensors. We try to accomplish this by presenting a very large number of remote sensing products as images which are described in a running text that explains their characteristics and utility. This Internet/CD-ROM means of delivery of the Tutorial is thus image intensive. -the abundance of pictorials becomes the principal learning device rather than the more customary dependence on textual description, supported by photographs, found in most pedagogical textbooks. The old adage that "a picture is worth a 1000 words" holds especially true in remote sensing because it can convey, when accompanied by a brief textual commentary, a great deal about how remote sensing is done and the methodology/rationale by which information is gleaned from a pictorial product. And, with the CD-ROM format, the liberal use of color, which often conveys much more information than black and white, becomes feasible - being not subject to the cost limitations that affect presentation in many books.
The Tutorial may well be the first such (Internet; CD-ROM) "book" in remote sensing to contain a significant part of its illustrations acquired directly from downloading off the Net. (Of course, as those familiar with the Internet well know, commonly Net images are digitized at low resolution [typically 72 dpi] and are thus of limited quality; this accounts for the "fuzziness" of many illustrations in the Tutorial.)
Because of its size and the many illustrations, the Tutorial can be treated almost as a textbook. It is hoped that some teachers, especially at the college level, will use the Tutorial either as a bona fide text or as a supplement.
One singular characteristic of the Remote Sensing Tutorial is the inclusion within the continuing text of each Section (not at the end of a chapter as is the case in most textbooks) of a series of thought or interpretive questions. The answers are included on both the CD-ROM and Internet versions. There will normally be 10 to 40+ questions per Section. There are also two "Exams" (after Section 1 and Section 21) that challenge you to conduct remote sensing interpretations on images from two adjacent areas in central Pennsylvania. This Overview has only a half dozen questions. Lets introduce you to the type of questions to expect by asking this one right now.
Name:
JOHN
BOLTON
Email:
john.bolton at gsfc.nasa.gov
Contact Address:
Code 420
Earth Observing System: Program Office
NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center City:
Greenbelt
Province or State:
Maryland
Postal Code:
20771
Country:
USA
Personnel
TYLER
B.
STEVENS Role:
SERF AUTHOR
Phone:
(301) 614-6898
Fax:
301-614-5268
Email:
Tyler.B.Stevens at nasa.gov
Contact Address:
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center
Global Change Master Directory City:
Greenbelt
Province or State:
MD
Postal Code:
20771
Country:
USA
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