Integrated atmospheric data visualization

Question

Are there Python solutions on the Internet for satellite / radar / lidar / airborne 2D / 3D atmospheric measurements? My range of interests ranges from simply overlaying flight traces from satellite imagery / data to combined visualizations of the lidar / radar / airplane measurements (inside them) and with the corresponding satellite pixels.

I would be happy to know if such rendering attempts (tools or custom Python scripts) exist before I start working on my own solutions.

Thanks.

Answer 1

For 2D images, you might consider using the NCL , released by the NCAR (National Center for Atmospheric Research), which is specifically designed to manipulate and build atmospheric (meteorological) data. An impressive gallery of results is available on this site . IMO's NCL syntax can be very ugly at times, and it looks like python PyNGL shell ( gallery ) now exists

Some of my colleagues used a number of very impressive tools to visualize 3D atmospheric data, including vis5d and steam .

For maximum flexibility, mayavi2 , which is basically a MATLAB-style ipython interface for Kitware VTK library, is used in a huge range of scientific visualizations. I do not recommend this approach if you do not want to "collapse your own", but it is very nice if you need to get three-dimensional results that look right.

Answer 2

Your question is pretty vague. Do you have 2D / 3D renderings, or do you render them yourself? Are they contour plots or datasets? There are a large number of python packages, but without being more specific, I suggest exploring this site . I used

matplotlib.backends.backendbackend_agg.FigureCanvasAgg(fig) 

for some of my data, and I heard well about Basemap. It all depends on what you do with what you have.

Answer 3

Individual answer:

ccplot

ccplot is an open-source command-line application that is capable of creating two-dimensional sections of profile, layer and ground datasets from CloudSat CPR, CALIPSO CALIOP and Aqua MODIS HDF4 and HDF-EOS2 cloud systems.

Answer 4

For those who are starting this issue now with similar needs, there is a tool called CIS , which provides the construction and comparison of a number of data sets including aircraft data, CALIOP L2, MODIS L2 and others. It also provides a subset and aggregation of data when used.

This is a command line tool in the first place, but there is also a Python API - see http://cis.readthedocs.org for more information.

Full disclosure: I am the lead developer of this tool, and I am happy to give more specific answers to more specific questions.