The seminar teaches the basics of radar remote sensing. Specific examples are used to familiarize participants with the advantages and challenges of radar remote sensing compared to optical data.

Optical remote sensing already offers a wealth of possibilities for observing and detecting changes in the landscape. However, sometimes we can't get any further with this data. For example, if we are in tropical regions or want to detect flooding or landslides, but can't see anything apart from dense cloud cover and also need information about the soil composition and structure, radar data offers a solution. In particular through the Copernicus program and the provision of Sentinel-1 data, the analysis of radar data is playing an increasingly important role. In the seminar, participants will learn the basics of radar remote sensing and then apply them to specific case studies.

The seminar is divided into two parts: In the first part, the basics of radar remote sensing are taught and practiced with initial examples. In the second part, the knowledge acquired is then transferred to case studies from applied radar remote sensing in small groups.

Confident with the basic functions in Google Earth Engine and the contextual integration into new and existing project structures.

Google Earth Engine (GEE) is a cloud-based analysis platform for spatial data that enables its users to observe changes in the land and sea surface across scales, accessing several petabytes of freely available sensor data and processing it in the backend to save resources. The diverse fields of application include environmental changes such as the decrease in biomass or temperature changes, but also the general changes in urban and rural areas. The seminar introduces the basic application possibilities of the modern platform and trains the creation of first simple, coherent codes for data query and processing within the web interface. In the block seminar, time series analyses with remote sensing data from active and passive sensor systems are carried out and their implementation with JavaScript is deepened. During the seminar, the seminar participants have the task of dealing more intensively with a research question in GEE, applying what they have learned and integrating this into a coherent project report, in the form of a story map, on current topics in the field of modern remote sensing. 

After a general introduction to the handling of the platform, many practical examples are used to introduce the GEE-internal code landscape in order to analyze landscape changes with multi-sensor and multi-scale approaches using selected thematic approaches. The course teaches two core contextual skills: The practiced use of the GEE as well as the preparation and modification of scripts in the first part, followed by the second part in which the new methods are applied within small groups to selected remote sensing topics and thereby embedded in a classical scientific research work. The new technical approaches are thus immediately transferred into a practical application and the efficient preparation of structured research work in a team is practiced.

Helpful literature recommendations will be given in the course of the block seminar.

Acquisition of qualitative and quantitative data from digital aerial photographs by means of digital photogrammetry

Photogrammetric remote sensing products

Fundamentals of (digital) photogrammetry

Leica Photogrammetry Suite

Stereoscopic vision on screen

3D digitisation of objects

Generation of terrain models

ESRI ArcScene

Visualisation of three-dimensional data in GIS

will be announced in the courses