Week 10: Drones and Big Brother- Who's Watching You?

Most likely, you’ve gone on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, or some type of social media today.  Think of all the information you put out into cyberspace: credit cards for shopping, personal information for online banking, and loads of information from email and other messaging.  Since the dawn of the personal computer, society has gotten more and more connected.  Most people share their day-to-day activities with more people online than those they interact with in reality.  As our lives and personal information become more and more intertwined with the Internet, questions start to arise over privacy rights.  The capability to find any information in cyberspace is out there, but who should be allowed access this information and at what times?  This Wednesday during class, we watched Enemy of the State, where these privacy questions are explored.   

 

http://pixshark.com/enemy-of-the-state-dvd.htm

In the movie, the leader of the National Security Agency (NSA) Thomas Brian Reynolds wants to pass a bill, and he kills a politician who has the ability to stop the bill from passing.  In order to cover up his wrongdoing, Reynolds uses all his powers, from satellites and trackers to online hacking in order to cover up his tracks, killing numerous people and smearing the name of a prominent lawyer.  In the end, the truth is exposed, but the question of personal security remains, summed up in the movie quote by Larry King: “How do we draw the line—draw the line between protection of national security, obviously the government's need to obtain intelligence data, and the protection of civil liberties, particularly the sanctity of my home? You've got no right to come into my home!”  In the movie there is dispute over the use of satellites to spy on individuals, but in current events drones have started to raise alarm over privacy issues.  Unlike satellites that have to continually be in one orbit, drones are able to hover over one spot and travel any way the controller wishes, making them a potentially much more efficient and useful tool for spying.   

 

A commercial drone and a drone used by the US Army

http://jurist.org/feature/featured/drones/ 

http://dronesafetycouncil.com/

The United States has placed strict rules on drone use, but other countries of the world are much more relaxed.  Are drones a hazard to public safety, or has the danger been over-dramatized?  The opinions on this matter run the gambit, but I believe it’s important to know the regulations concerning drones before deciding if they pose a threat or not.  In order to fly a drone, the user must get a Certificate of Waiver or Authorization from the Federal Aviation Administration.  UAVs for recreational purposes are only allowed to fly below 400 feet and must remain within eyesight.  In the government, drones are only officially able to fly in a certain areas.  The question remains, how are these strictures enforced?  As history has shown, tremendous power can lead to tremendous corruption.  In order to keep protect personal privacy, we have to make sure we keep those that hold great power in the future in check.

Week Nine: Taking to the Skies

This week during lab on Wednesday our class put action to all we have learned about aerial photography, taking to the skies with balloons and cameras.  The seminar class split into different groups, and we each had separate research projects and aerial balloon camera designs.  For my group’s aerial photography project, we decided to study the use of footpaths on the Furman campus around South Housing and the Lakeside Judson dorm.  During our time at Furman, my group members and I have noticed that many of the walking paths at Furman are not used, and students decide to take the most efficient path instead.  By collecting aerial photograph data during a class change, we could identify student-made paths with heavy foot traffic and the paved paths that not many people use.   

The main areas where we planned to collect aerial data

When the day came to actually collect the data, most of the groups decided to lift their camera into the air with many, many party balloons.  My group partnered with another team and ordered an aerial photography balloon kit online, so we used a very large balloon almost 2 meters tall when inflated.  The balloon kit also came with zip ties, carabiners, rope, gloves, rubber bands, and a rubber ring; everything to help get the balloon in the sky.  Although the balloon came with everything we needed, we had to build our own housing for the camera.  To make it, we cut out the top of a 2-liter bottle, and using rubber bands, suspended the go pro camera inside it.  We used a large can of helium from Dr. Suresh to fill up the balloon.  We had to inflate the balloon separately three times because we underestimated the amount of helium it took to lift out camera in the air.  Finally, the balloon was strong enough to lift the go pro. 

The group we were sharing the balloon kit with needed to collect data on tree removal on the mall, so we took the balloon first to the large circular lawn in front of the PAC.  In order to avoid trees, we planned to release the balloon in the open lawn area until it reached above tree level then walk through the mall.  Everything was going as planned as we walked through the mall when SUDDENLY a gust of wind blew our balloon far to the left.  After that, the balloon sunk back below tree level, and the camera holder became stuck in a tree.  We tried to get the balloon back down to no avail, so we decided to call campus maintenance.  Seeing that the official induction of the new Furman president was the next day, the maintenance team was eager to remove a giant, red rubber balloon from the middle of campus.  After a long while of waiting and the use of a cherry picker, we were able bring down a popped balloon and an intact go pro.  Though my group was not able to do our research, the other team gathered an innumerable measure of data on tree branches.  

 Next week, Dr. Suresh is going to take my group out with a drone, so we can collect our data.  Although my group spent most of its time trying to get the balloon out of a tree, I learned valuable information about how to get a balloon in the air and how difficult taking aerial photography really is.

 

Week Eight: Viva la Resolution!

Over the weeks we've figured out different things about remote sensing with satellites: their precursors, their uses, how they orbit in Earth, and the electromagnetic radiation they pick up.  The question still remains, how does a satellite pick up this information?  How can one satellite see heat while another sees infrared light, or more broadly, what creates differences between satellites?  Some important distinctions between satellites are their resolutions. 

There are four different types of resolution concerning remote sensing: spatial resolution, spectral resolution, radiometric resolution, and temporal resolution.  All these factor in to the type of information a satellite is able to gather, and they are important to further understanding on how satellites really work.

Spatial resolution is one of the simplest distinguishers between satellites.  It is basically the smallest feature a satellite is able to distinguish.  This is also the pixel size of an object.  An example of spatial resolution that I’m sure almost everyone reading this has experienced is whenever we try to make a picture bigger, and it turns into a blur of squares.  An easy way to think of spatial resolution is that the bigger you can make a photo without it turning into squares, the higher the spatial resolution.

 

high spatial resolution → low spatial resolution

Source: http://coast.noaa.gov/geozone/you-say-you-want-high-resolution/

 

Next, spectral resolution determines what types of electromagnetic wavelengths a satellite can pick up.  The finer the spectral resolution, the smaller waves the satellite can distinguish.  This is the difference between black and white film and color film.  Black and white film lumps all the different colors together and sees them as either black or white.  Alternately, the finer resolution of color film allows the sensor to distinguish between different colors.

 

                                       

 Different spectral resolutions

Source: http://www.nrcan.gc.ca/earth-sciences/geomatics/satellite-imagery-air-photos/satellite-imagery-products/educational-resources/9407

Radiometric resolution relates to spectral resolution concerning the quality of a satellite image.  Spectral resolution determines the amount of pixels in an image, but the radiometric resolution affects how the satellite discerns differences in energy (think of shading in a photograph being either very gradual or very abrupt).

                                       

Examples of differences in radiometric resolution

Source: http://www.slideshare.net/merdevie/remote-sensing-10526190

Lastly, temporal resolution is the amount of time it takes a satellite to pass over the same place on Earth again.  This is important for what purpose the satellite has.  For a LANDSAT, the temporal resolution is 16 days.  If we want to see a real time event from the air, then we would want a satellite with faster temporal resolution.

Bibliography:

Intermap Technologies Ltd. Tutorial: Fundamentals of Remote Sensing. Ottawa: Canada Centre for Remote Sensing, 2013. Print.