ESRM190: Digital Earth

Tentative Schedule

This course uses a flipped classroom mode of teaching, you will view lectures on your own time and have live interactions with the faculty on TBD (these will also be recorded).

  • Module 1: Introduction the Digital Earth
    • Topic: Introduction to the Digital Earth
    • Concept: What is geospatial science?
    • Tool: Interactive activity using the Windy app
    • Demo: My story in Google Earth
    • Assignment: Tell your story
  • Module 2: Earth observation
    • Topic: History of earth observation
    • Concept: Spatial resolution
    • Tool: Practice airphoto interpretation
    • Demo: Airphoto interpretation – An example
    • Assignment: Training your eye to interpret aerial imagery
  • Module 3: How does remote sensing work? What are we actually sensing?
    • Topic: What is remote sensing”
    • Concept: Active vs. passive sensors
    • Tool: Lidar
    • Demo: Using remote sensing to identify geohazards
    • Assignment: Identifying the geohazards in your story
  • Module 4: Seeing beyond the visible
    • Topic: Spectral reflectance
    • Concept: Band combinations
    • Tool: Landsat
    • Demo: Analysis using Landsat satellite imagery
    • Assignment: Seeing the world beyond the visible
  • Module 5: An overview of all the tools we use for earth observation
    • Topic: Overview of all remote sensing sensors
    • Concept: Spectral and temporal resolution
    • Tool: UAVs (aka drones) & digital aerial photogrammetry
    • Demo: Live demo – TBD
    • Assignment: Remote sensing in action!
  • Module 6: How do you turn an image into a map?
    • Topic: Classification
    • Concept: Classified maps
    • Tool: Object based image analysis
    • Demo: How to use a classified map
    • Assignment: Mapping your world
  • Module 7: Remote sensing our changing world
    • Topic: Change detection
    • Concept: Temporal resolution
    • Tool: Time series analysis
    • Demo: Google earth
    • Assignment: Analyzing your world
  • Module 8: Big Data
    • Topic: Overview of artificial intelligence (A.I.) and big data
    • Concept: Machine learning, neural networks etc..
    • Tool: Develop your own A.I. map
    • Demo: Artificial intelligence
    • Assignment: Introduction to Google Earth Engine
  • Module 9: Putting it all together
    • Topic: Using your geospatial toolkit
    • Concept: Resolution domains
    • Tool: Combining datasets together
    • Demo: Examples of data fusion
    • Final Project: Applying your geospatial toolkit
  • Module 10:Future of geospatial science
    • Topic: Careers in geospatial science
    • Concept: New frontiers. Where is this field going?
    • Tool: Other applications of geospatial technology
    • Demo: Earth as Art
    • Extra Credit: Discovering your motivation for remote sensing –  Art &Tech