UrtheCast to Stream Video of the Planet from Space UrtheCast
go to original March 29, 2013

UrtheCast is beaming footage of our blue marble back from the International Space Station that’s high def enough to find your house.

About UrtheCast

By developing the first high-definition streaming video platform of Earth, UrtheCast plans to change the way we view the world. With the help of prominent aerospace partners like RSC Energia, UrtheCast is building, launching, installing, and operating two cameras onboard the International Space Station.

In second half of 2013, video of Earth will begin streaming across the globe. Everyone from web surfers and smartphone users, to media representatives and agriculturists, will be able to use the UrtheCast platform to see world events unfold in near real-time. App developers will have access to open source Earth video data, while educators will be able to harness rich video for their lesson plans. What’s more, environmental monitoring services and humanitarian relief organizations will have access to dynamic imagery as an additional tool in their relief efforts.

The Experience

When you begin using the platform, it will feel much like you’re interacting with a mashup of Google Earth and YouTube. You will be able to scroll, pan, zoom, and search your way around the Earth video stream, which will reveal everything from natural wonders of the world to buzzing urban centers.

How It Will Work

One medium-resolution and one high-resolution camera will be launched to space by the Soyuz Mission and mounted to the underside of the Russian segment of the Space Station. As the Station orbits the globe, Earth imagery will be captured by both cameras and stored onboard the ISS. This imagery will then be downlinked to groundstations positioned across the planet. Here it will be processed and streamed to the web in near real-time, casting a view of the world only astronauts have experienced.

To get the chance to test UrtheCast's web platform, sign-up here.

The Platform

The UrtheCast web platform will feel like a blending of a video version of GoogleEarth with the video playback and search functionality of YouTube. It will operate seamlessly with social media sites like Facebook and Twitter.

With the world’s first and only near real time high definition video from space, the UrtheCast experience will be truly unique and will generate significant awareness, publicity and User interest world-wide:

• Enabling a uniquely powerful perspective on major international news stories like the crisis at Fukushima, the public uprising in Tahrir square, or refugee camps in the Sudan

• Empowering students with a rich educational perspective for viewing the wonders of the planet in a manner never before possible

• Unlocking human creativity and ingenious user generated content with events like flash crowds, innovative wedding proposals, and “the wave” at sporting events

• Creating a singular vantage point for observing environmental events around the world with recent and relevant video footage of earthquakes, floods, volcanoes, droughts and the effects of environmental change

• Providing a vehicle for innumerable gaming and cross-platform media applications and partnerships across the entertainment and social media spectrum

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