Satellite imagery into Google Earth

I was asked “what is an easy way to get a satellite image into Google Earth?”. Once I explained how I do it I thought it may be of interest to others. NASA have provided a really excellent web interface to some of their visual data called Worldview.

The Worldview description puts into perspective how good it is.

The Worldview tool from NASA's EOSDIS provides the capability to interactively browse global, full-resolution satellite imagery and then download the underlying data. Most of the 200+ available products are updated within three hours of observation, essentially showing the entire Earth as it looks "right now"

More than 200 data products within three hours…

Open worldview and this is the screen you are greeted with. It is easy to use. The key regions are the projection / copy / link tool in the yellow square on the right, the date control in the yellow box on the bottom of the browser screen and the layers control in the yellow box on the left.

Worldview opening screen.
Worldview opening screen.

I do recommend following the tour to find your way around the data sets.

Worldview tour screen
Worldview tour screen

If you click the layers button (red on the left) this is just a part of the choice of real time data you can easily access.

Some of the data choices available in WorldView
Some of the data choices available in Worldview

So you select the data you want to see, and then you can zoom in and easily download areas of interest. For some reason I always seem to find my way at this view

Worldview Antarctic stereographic view.
Worldview Antarctic stereographic view.

This movie I made shows how you can get  imagery from Worldview easily into Google Earth.

I hope you find this useful. It's easy to spend a lot of time looking at this data.