Access to Earth observation data and tools for visualisation

A wide variety of ways exist to access and work with Earth observation data for visualisation purposes. Which data access routes and/or visualisation tools an individual chooses will depend on some combination of the following considerations:

• Is an appropriate “off-the-shelf” visualisation readily available through an existing service (quicker/easier/less flexible), or do you need to develop your own approach (slower/more difficult/more flexible)?

• Is a single image enough to illustrate the complexity of the topic, or are a series of images/animation needed?

• Is imagery suitable and sufficient on it’s own, or is more detailed data analysis and visualisation required?

Below, we present some visualising approaches that address these considerations, beginning with the most convenient and least complex and proceeding in order of complexity until we arrive at code-based tools that offer unlimited flexibility but require a significant time investment.

• Viewers
• Dashboards
• Software for image generation and analysis
• Thematic code based approaches
• Summary reports
• Other data visualisation guides and resources

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