EO Dashboard Hackathon

SMILE STONES | Storytelling in the COVID-19 Era

Awards & Nominations

SMILE STONES has received the following awards and nominations. Way to go!

Global Finalist

Storytelling in the COVID-19 Era

The longer human activities are changed due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the more visible, wider, and longer lasting the scope of environmental impacts may be. Your challenge is to tell a visual story about the impacts of the pandemic using Earth observation data and other complementary information.

Achieving Smile Stones

Summary

We have created visuals, a Voyager experience and a Webpage to best convey the Impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic. The visuals(videos) tell us the impacts of the pandemic and how we can adopt the lessons it taught us to accelerate the process of saving the planet. The video was created using data, images, infographics from the EO DASHBOARD besides some other. The voyager experience takes us around world where at every stop there is some animal greeting you and talking to you. The webpage is like a library of our project. It houses interesting analysis made from the EO Dashboard.

How I Addressed This Challenge

Visuals rule the internet space in the present.

We developed :

1.Two videos - A Demo video and a One and a half minute long video .

2 A Webpage .

3. A google voyager experience .

Without knowing the problem we can not solve it.-The google voyager experience tackles this statement .It takes us around the world to hear from our struggling animal friends.

The rising temperature of the earth is not a new story , but it has got updates. Most people often think there is nothing that they can do about it. That thought needs to be altered in order to save the planet. That is why it's important to communicate the current scenario , the urgency to take actions , the need to invent ideas and change perspectives to tackle Climate change more often and more effectively.- This insight is the foundation of the video.

The change from pre-Covid to the current scenario can be analyzed from the webpage which allows the user to understand various aspect of different issues.-The webpage is designed to convey simplified analysis that we made on the process and some of the interesting data from the dashboard.

The pandemic story and its lessons need to reach out to maximum people. In the project-- using the techniques of simplified storytelling and powerful visuals along with deeply thought ideas --We hope to plant an urge for action and invention in people so that we can keep the planet's biodiversity's "fading" smile from completely fading out.

How I Developed This Project

We are inspired to get to a place where Earth's biodiversity's smile is not fading out in the heat of evolution -that could potentially lead to a climate disaster and wipe out every life that ever was on earth.

While developing the project we always knew we wanted it to be a video that didn't need to be very wordy. So we went about this way:

1 . The first few days we scrutinized information all over the internet but mostly EO DASHBOBOARD, EURO DATA CUBE, and official sites of JAXA , NASA AND ESA . We then collected information on how animals were being affected due to climate change and other human activities, and what was being done to help them. At this stage the Google Earth Voyager experience was also made.

Software used till this stage: Google earth, Google meet, Microsoft onenote.

2.Then we worked on the script of the video. We tried different ways , tricks and tips, and the video was made. It took about 2 days.

Software used in this stage: Microsoft Video Editor, Openshot, Google photos.

3 . While the Video was being made a part of the team was working on the webpage to create a library of interesting analysis and our experiences.

At this stage- HTML,CSS, JavaScript using VScode, Notepad++ was used. Netlify and Github was used to host.

How I Used Space Agency Data in This Project

Using the EO dashboard data and images was truly fun. Being able to make a time lapse with satellite imagery was a moment of euphoria. In fact that's when we realized the dashboard data could be used to make a powerful visual to address important issues revolving around the planet. That's how the DASBOARD data got us started . As we worked on the topic we also collected necessary data from sites listed in "References" box.

Of the space agencies we used data from:

JAXA Missions-ALOS World 3D Map, ALOS 2 , PALSAR mosaic data.

ESA Missions- Sentinel 1, Sentinel2.

NASA missions-Suomi NPP/VIIRS ,TRMM GPM Missions.

Project Demo

A Narrative style description of the project [This story style narrative shows how our solution could impact the world]

Demo video-https://youtu.be/QyppTmVB184

Murph- Hey! Just looked up this video. I'm curious .

Smile Stone- Hello! Please go ahead.

Murph-Your visuals are so easy to understand from. Where can I find images like these that are authentic too ?

Smile Stone- You can look up sites like : esa.int ,nasa.gov, jaxa , EO DASBOARD, eurodatacube, and more. You can make time lapses or comparative analysis from images and graphs present there. Which will help you understand what's happening to the planet.

Murph-Umm .. Wish I could see all these that you are talking of. I learnt better about dispersion when the teacher showed us light passing through a prism.

Smile Stone- Then why don't you check this Video out. --- https://youtu.be/GF1mwAFb3V4

Murph-My brother is 4 year old and he loves watching polar bears on screen. I wonder what would they be talking about amongst themselves being a species that is vulnerable to extinction .

Smile Stone- Really ! We got something for you then -- Google Earth Voyager Experience

https://earth.google.com/earth/d/1jH9OYyDnMV5HdB2b5yFEFLhGrPAJc91T?usp=sharing

Murph- Wow! This was such a voyage! I really want them to stay.

Smile Stone- Oh yes , to get there we all have to keep working and doing our part. Something as simple as supporting brands that are eco-friendly could make a difference if done in large scale. The more we choose to take action, even if it is something as simple as reducing the use of plastics in our daily life, the better it gets.

Murph- Hey What does "Smile stones" exactly mean?

Smile Stone- "Smile Stone" is a concept of steering towards a perspective in which we achieve a biodiversity where it's not just humans smiling while the smile on the faces of other flora and fauna is fading out.

Murph- I'm going to care more for the planet. Thank you . Where can I learn more about the team.

Smile Stone- Thank you so much Murph. That decision could make so much of a difference . You can learn about us and our work here through this .---- Webpage-https://smilestones.netlify.app/#teams

Earth Observing Dashboard Integration

From our solution -

The Video- Has visuals created by using images from EO DASHBORD data and other sources. After creative brainstorming over the first 5 days of the Hackathon we integrated those graphics in a way that's easy to apprehend from and is effective . So these visuals could be integrated into the dashboard or displayed there :

1. to give users an understanding of how the dashboard could be used to enhance learning about the world in classrooms , communities and other forums.

2 . users could be inspired to make their own kind of application of the DASHBOARD .

The Webpage- The database is varied in the forms of graphs, pie charts and satellite images giving us a wider picture. The change from pre-Covid to the current scenario can be analyzed from here.

The analysis is of 6 folds:

Wildlife

Air quality

Mobility

Agriculture

Night lights

Water quality

The analysis on these topics from the Webpage could be used as self explanatory visuals .

LINKS:

VIDEO-https://youtu.be/GF1mwAFb3V4

WEBPAGE-https://smilestones.netlify.app/#teams

GOOGLE EARTH VOYAGER- https://earth.google.com/earth/d/1jH9OYyDnMV5HdB2b5yFEFLhGrPAJc91T?usp=sharing