Looking Back...Looking Forward, eMap Turns 10

This month, January 2010, eMap International enters its 10th year of business. A lot has changed in 10 years. In 2000, digital aerial cameras were expensive prototypes and besides aerial film with be around forever, right? LiDAR was an interesting emerging technology but it would really only have application to corridor mapping, right? Earth imaging satellites were having difficulty getting off the launch pad and would never have much impact on the geospatial mapping community, right?

Read more from CEO David K. Nale here »

The World's Most Advanced Satellite, WorldView-2, is Operational and Accepting Orders

January 4, 2010 marks a historic day for GIS and Remote Sensing professionals as it was this date that the world's most advanced satellite, WorldView-2, was certified as fully tested and operational and began tasking commercial orders. As such, in this edition of GeoView, eMap is pleased to announce that we are now accepting tasking (and archive, all be it limited at the time) orders for WV2 high-resolution satellite imagery.

Read more about WorldView-2's full operating capacity»

Preview of the Q4 2009 FASS ParcelPoint Release and New Parcel Product Samples

In the month of December, First American Spatial Solutions released an update of their US-wide ParcelPoint layer. Below is a preview of the updated map as well as insight into the next counties to be added to the ParcelPoint database over the next two quarters. In next month's GeoView, we will offer specifics on the newly released and updated ParcelPoint counties.

Read more about Q4 2009 FASS ParcelPoint Releases and New Parcel Product Samples »

Tasking Policy Update - QuickBird, WorldView-1 and WorldView-2

Starting January 1, 2010, all new tasking orders placed on QuickBird, WorldView-1 and WorldView-2 will come with a 15% or less cloud cover guarantee at no additional cost. This includes all mono and stereo tasking orders placed at all tasking priorities except for Rush Tasking. Haze is still not considered cloud cover if there is visible land below. Please contact eMap with any questions about this policy change at (720) 470-7988 or bmccarty@map-int.com.

Update on the GeoEye-1 Antenna Issue

An irregularity with the antenna, detected on Dec 11 caused the company to suspend imagery collection for a time. The official statement of the problem: "The irregularity appears to limit the range of movement of GeoEye-1's downlink antenna, which may in turn affect GeoEye-1's ability to image and downlink simultaneously."

Read more about the update on the GeoEye-1 Antenna Issue»

Newly Released High Resolution Satellite and Aerial Orthomosaics

Each month, eMap has access to newly released digital orthomosaics of aerial imagery inside the United States and the European Union; and to orthomosaics of QuickBird satellite imagery in other international areas. This section introduces all of the aerial and QuickBird imagery datasets released in the last month.

Read more about the newly released high-resolution satellite and aerial orthomosaics here »

Word of the Month - Tasking Feasibility

With the recent announcement that commercial orders are now being accepted on WorldView-2, it seems appropriate to focus on the 'Tasking Feasibility' for this edition of Word of the Month. A tasking feasibility is the first step of any new collection with either GeoEye-1, IKONOS, QuickBird or the WorldView satellites and is an estimate of the time it will take to collect your order at the agreed upon cloud cover guarantee.

Read more here »

Geospatial Freebie of the Month - Declassified Cold War Satellite Imagery and US Vector Layers

For the January 2010 Geospatial Freebie of the Month, we are offering you a two for one deal as one of the deals is not exactly free (but it's darn near close!). In the past several months, the US government has released over 800,000 high-resolution images collected by the once classified CORONA, ARGON and LANYARD series satellites between 1959 and 1972. The film-based imagery is ~1-meter panchromatic only data, but if you need a historic view in high-resolution of a distant land this might be your only option. The cost is $30 per frame of data.

Read more here »

Free Service - Data Alert

Do you have an area of interest around the world for which you just can't seem to find imagery?

Or do you have a project on the near horizon which will require imagery?

If you answered yes to either of these questions, then eMap International is pleased to offer you the perfect free service*, Data Alert. Once you sign up for Data Alert, we will periodically search for the data you need and alert you if and when it has been collected. Signing up is quick and easy so you can sit back and let eMap do the work for you!

How do you sign up for Data Alert?

To sign up for Data Alert, all you have to do is respond to this newsletter with information on your:

1. Geographic location of interest (less than 1,000 sq km; defined by coordinates, KMZ/KML or ESRI shapefile)

2. Acceptable resolution and spectral bands

3. Special timing/seasonal considerations for the data

We will get you set up from there!

*There is no obligation to buy data by eMap. Standard archive pricing and minimum order prices apply.