<span style="font-family:arial, sans-serif;font-size:13px;border-collapse:collapse"><div>Sorry for the repeat sending, it didn't go through to the OSGeo list...</div><div><br></div><div>
================================================</div><div><br></div>Hi all -<div><br></div><div>We talked last time we met at the Media Lab about doing rectified balloon photography, so here's an update! Is anyone interested in meeting in the first week of December or the last of November to do some more balloon mapping and have another meetup to exchange ideas? We can host it at the Media Lab again. Maybe we could meet on a Saturday so we can balloon in the daylight?</div>
<div><br></div><div>-Jeff</div><div><br></div><div>##############################################################################</div><div>Link: <a href="http://unterbahn.com/2009/11/grassroots-aerial-map/" style="color:rgb(0, 101, 204)" target="_blank">Grassroots Mapping: Balloon test #3 success</a></div>
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<div><span style="font-family:helvetica, arial, sans-serif;font-size:12px;color:rgb(34, 34, 34);line-height:16px"><p><a href="http://www.levinger.net/josh/" style="color:rgb(86, 145, 73)" target="_blank">Josh Levinger</a> of <a href="http://groundtruth.media.mit.edu/" style="color:rgb(109, 191, 53)" target="_blank">GroundTruth</a> and I tested our larger 8 foot balloon yesterday, and it was a huge success! We ran all the way through our spool of string, and got some great images before the light got too dim. I rectified them using <a href="http://warper.geothings.net/" style="color:rgb(109, 191, 53)" target="_blank">Map Warper</a> (fantastic!) and we now have a mostly continuous ’scan’ of our flight.</p>
<p><a href="http://warper.geothings.net/layers/31" style="color:rgb(109, 191, 53)" target="_blank"><img src="http://unterbahn.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/11/Screen-shot-2009-11-19-at-11.04.31-PM1.png" alt="Screen shot 2009-11-19 at 11.04.31 PM" title="Screen shot 2009-11-19 at 11.04.31 PM" width="549" height="508" style="border-top-width:0px;border-right-width:0px;border-bottom-width:0px;border-left-width:0px;border-style:initial;border-color:initial"></a></p>
<p>This means this can be a viable way to capture high-resolution geolocated imagery at low cost! I spent under $100 on the equipment – $30 for the balloon, $40 for the camera, $5 for the helium, and a few bucks for string. I bet it could be done for under $50 with a cheaper camera and perhaps trash bags instead of latex balloons. We’ll be trying that soon – I’d guess we need about 10 of these <a href="http://www.ourshippingsupplies.com/productDetails.asp?id=LD-1525R-RC" style="color:rgb(109, 191, 53)" target="_blank">98-gallon bags</a>. I also turned the ISO way up for this because the light was failing, so the photos are pretty grainy. This camera doesn’t have shutter speed settings, though I’m still playing around with the <a href="http://chdk.wikia.com/" style="color:rgb(109, 191, 53)" target="_blank">CHDK</a> settings so maybe I’ll do better next time.</p>
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