GPM Constellation swath animation

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Version of the GPM animation showing swath widths on the ground.

Feb 5, 2003

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This page shows the status of the swath animation.


These stills show 3 hours worth of swath for the GPM core satellite and the 8 potential constellation members (gpm core, constelation, dmsp 18, dmsp 19, megha-tropiques, gcom, egpm and npoess).

Swath for 3 hours of GPM core orbit

Swaths for 3 hours of 8 GPM contellation satellites, overlay=normal

Swaths for 3 hours of 8 GPM contellation satellites, overlay=combined

Swaths for 3 hours of 8 GPM contellation satellites, overlay=multicolor

The swath widths for the satellites are:

Satellite	swath width (km)	swath width (miles)
gpm core	858 km	533 miles
constellation	1403 km	870 miles
dmsp-18,dmsp-19	1707 km	1061 miles
megha-tropiques	1742 km	1083 miles
egpm	1343 km	835 miles
gcom	1600 km	994 miles
npoess-lite	1707 km	1061 miles
fy-3	1707 km	1061 miles

Here is a rough draft quicktime movie (2MB) of the GPM satellite laying down a swath that changes color with age (thanks to Mark for the idea) - the swath starts as purple, then ages to white. If I rendered all the swaths with this method, the final image would look like the 'overlay=combined' image above.




Finally, this test render shows the swaths for 8 GPM constellation members for 3 hours. Each satellite produces a different colored swath, which fades to gray over time. At the end of the animation the gray areas show the combined coverage of all 8 satellite after 3 hours. The image below links to a 4MB sorenson3 compressed quicktime movie. A 1.2 MB mpeg4 version is also available.






This test is a 640x480 movie with the swaths and satellites, there is a 17 MB sorenson compressed quicktime available and also a smaller 320x240 2 MB mpeg4