The Blue Marble Next Generation

A true color earth dataset including seasonal dynamics

By Reto Stöckli, Eric Vermote, Nazmi Saleous, Robert Simmon and David Herring, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center.

The Blue Marble Next Generation (BMNG) is a new series of 12 monthly cloud-free, global-scale images. The BMNG visualizes seasonal changes of the land surface (spring greening, snow-melt, drought, etc.) in monthly steps at 500 meters per pixel resolution. Each of the 12 images is more than 10 GB in size! We would like to encourage you to go on a visual exploration tour of our planet.

Our interactive viewer allows users to access this huge dataset without having to download the full dataset: simply zoom and pan the BMNG imagery in your favorite web-browser and switch between the seasons. Find your favorite mountain range or desert and take yourself on a journey to learn more about our fascinating planet Earth!

Each of the 12 images is stored at full resolution as a single ZIP compressed TIFF file and served dynamically by an eRez Imaging Server running on a standard DELL PowerEdge 1750 Server and displayed using the FSI Showcase.

The images can be of use in formal and informal education and allows to better understand and monitor our planet and its seasonal dynamics. We created the BMNG using NASA Terra MODerate resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) science data collected in 2004. The data was corrected by using a discrete Fourier seriees technique, which allows to remove cloud disturbances.