Raster Foundry: A Cloud-Based Platform for High-Resolution Imagery Management

Advances in small satellite and remote sensing technology are revolutionizing the Earth observation industry and providing critical new sources of consistent, continuous data for atmospheric, ocean, and land use studies at a range of spatial and temporal extents. The increasing availability and falling cost of this data has created the need for innovative new tools that can help organizations rapidly process large raster datasets in transformative new ways without years of specialized training or large investments in proprietary software and technology infrastructure. The resulting web platform solves several significant challenges around raster data processing and user experience design that have heretofore prevented the effective use of remotely sensed data by many organizations. Overall Objectives: The overall research objective was to automate complex image processing tasks that are currently the province of a small group of highly skilled professionals and make them more accessible, understandable, and affordable. The platform addresses this need by providing an entirely new type of user experience that makes raster processing capabilities available over the web, not only to GIS analysts and other trained geospatial professionals, but also to non-technical users in organizations ranging from local governments and humanitarian groups to financial and utility firms. What was Done in Phase II?: The goal of the Phase II research was to build out the Phase I prototype into a production-ready platform by way of iterative rounds of software development and testing. These activities were supported by an Advisory Board of subject matter expects and Beta testing with members of the future user community. What is Planned for the Phase IIB Project?: Users of the Beta application have provided valuable feedback on new features and usability that demonstrate both a marketplace need for the product and insight into technical enhancements that will improve the opportunity within that marketplace. To that end, the platform will be enhanced with a robust capacity to support feature classification and object labeling within the platform through the integration of machine learning pipelines. Commercial Applications and Other Benefits: The platform provides innovative tools to support ecosystems monitoring, change detection, long-range planning initiatives, and many other applications that will benefit current and future generations. Primary customers will include governments and private sector firms in the aerospace, water, satellite, and engineering industries organizations with a shared need to process Earth observation data. Partner relationships with micro-satellite companies, large prime contractors, nonprofits, and online mapping solutions are already generating revenue and interest.