Imagery from USGS CoastCam deployed at Madeira Beach, Florida

Before mounting the CoastCam at the beach, the camera (Allied Vision Technologies Prosilica GT3400C) was used to take intrinsic camera calibration images. Please refer to the MadeiraBeachFL_CoastCam_Calibration_metadata record included in this data release for more information on the calibration process. After calibration was complete, the camera mount was installed on the rooftop of Shoreline Island Resort (14200 Gulf Blvd, Madeira Beach, FL 33708) on 20161128. The camera was installed and connected to a control computer, wall powered, and wired ethernet connection in an interior room of the facility. The control computer was connected to a hard drive to transfer the images upon collection.

The camera was programmed to collect three-band images every hour during daylight hours and take video for 17 minutes. The images included in this data release were collected from January 21, 2017, to December 31, 2017. Gaps may exist in the dataset due to camera malfunction. Additionally, some images may have been obscured by water droplets, insects, birds, salt, sand and dirt, poor visibility from adverse weather conditions, or sun glare, and thus may not reflect the true state of the beach and ocean. Each time the camera was activated, there were five resultant image products collected: the "snapshot" ("snap") image is the first frame of the video; the “time exposure” ("timex") image is the average of all frames within the 17 minute video; the "variance" ("var") image shows the standard deviation of pixel intensity throughout the video; the “brightest” ("bright") image shows the brightest pixel values throughout the video; and the “darkest” ("dark") image shows the darkest pixel values throughout the video. The raw video data was sent to the control computer’s hard drive where the video was processed to produce the five image products per hour. The images were then sent via internet to a U.S. Geological Survey internal File Transfer Protocol (ftp) site. Files were automatically downloaded from the ftp site to the SPCMSC servers for further processing.

The images acquired with the camera were geotagged and processed to add additional information required by the USGS to the exchangeable image file format (EXIF) and other imagery headers using PyExifTool Python library (https://pypi.org/project/PyExifTool/, version: 0.5.5) and the files were renamed to a unique identifier based on the established Argus naming convention to avoid any possibility of duplicate names. The images were given EXIF header information in the directory with all the photos by assigning all the tags in a Python dictionary object to each photo using PyExifTool. The following describes the Python dictionary object with each entry in the dictionary being a tag-value pair: tags = {'Copyright': 'Public Domain', 'CopyrightNotice': 'Public Domain - please credit U.S. Geological Survey', 'Artist': 'USGS SPCMSC', 'Make': 'Allied Vision Technology', 'Model': 'Prosilica GT3400', 'GPSLatitude': '27.7962', 'GPSLongitude': '-82.7961', 'GPSMapDatum': 'EPSG:6318 (NAD83_National_Spatial_Reference_System_2011)', 'GPSLatitudeRef': 'N', 'GPSLongitudeRef': 'W', 'Credit': 'U.S. Geological Survey', 'Contact': 'gs-g-spcmsc_data_inquiries@usgs.gov', 'UsageTerms': "Unless otherwise stated, all data, metadata and related materials are considered to satisfy the quality standards relative to the purpose for which the data were collected. Although these data and associated metadata have been reviewed for accuracy and completeness and approved for release by the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), no warranty expressed or implied is made regarding the display or utility of the data for other purposes, nor on all computer systems, nor shall the act of distribution constitute any such warranty", 'AttributionURL': 'https://doi.org/10.5066/P9SGRTF1', 'Contributor': 'Jenna Brown, Justin Birchler, Sharifa Karwandyar, Eric Swanson, Meg Palmsten', 'XMP-photoshop:Credit': 'U.S. Geological Survey', 'iptcCore:CreatorWorkEmail': 'gs-g-spcmsc_data_inquiries@usgs.gov', 'Rights': 'Public Domain', 'ImageDescription': 'This image was captured from a stationary mounted camera at Madeira Beach, Florida. Field Activity Number: 2016-363-DD (https://cmgds.marine.usgs.gov/fan_info.php?fan=2016-363-DD)', 'Description': 'This image was captured from a stationary mounted camera at Madeira Beach, Florida. Field Activity Number: 2016-363-DD (https://cmgds.marine.usgs.gov/fan_info.php?fan=2016-363-DD)', 'ExternalMetadataLink': 'https://www1.usgs.gov/pir/api/identifiers/USGS:c9505061-c301-4d19-bb9e-4810fd2f99eb'}. All of the previously listed tags were the same for each image. Additionally, there were tags added to the Python dictionary object that would have a different value for each image depending on factors such as the filename and/or date when the image was captured. These tags and an example value are included as follows, as well as a description for why the values differ, as needed: 'Datetime': '2023:08:14 14:31:05-04:00', in EXIF this is shown as 'File Modification Date/Time'; 'DateTimeOriginal': 2017-01-21 14:00:00; 'PreservedFileName': '1485007200.Sat.Jan.21_14_00_00.GMT.2017.madbeach.c1.bright.jpg'; 'GPSDateStamp': '2016:11:30', this value is the date of the closest previous extrinsic camera calibration at the time the image was taken; 'Caption': 'The brightest image taken at the Madeira Beach, FL camera site (station name: madbeach) on 2017-01-21 14:00:00', this value is dependent on the image product type--brightest, darkest, variance, time exposure, or snapshot--and the date/time the image was captured; 'Caption-Abstract': 'The brightest image represents the maximum intensity of each pixel during the 17-minute video. The image was taken at the Madeira Beach, FL site (station name: madbeach), FAN 2016-363-DD, on 2017-01-21 14:00:00. For more info, see https://www.usgs.gov/centers/spcmsc/science/video-remote-sensing-coastal-processes', also dependent on image type and date/time; 'Comment': ' Brightest image for 2017-01-21 14:00:00; Madeira Beach, FL site (station name: madbeach); FAN 2016-363-DD', also dependent on image product type and date/time. 'Keywords': 'brightest, madbeach, remote sensing', dependent on the image product type. All the JPEG images were renamed to ensure unique filenames and compliance with the USGS Coastal and Marine Hazard and Resources Program's (CMHRP) best practices for image naming convention. Images were renamed with the image acquisition date and Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) in computer and human readable format, the camera location, the camera number, and the image type that distinguishes among the five camera outputs. For example, image name '1485007200.Sat.Jan.21_14_00_00.GMT.2017.madbeach.c1.bright.jpg', where 1485007200 is the 10-digit epoch time convention of the date and time, Sat is the three character day of the week, Jan is the three character month, 21 is the two digit day of the month, 14_00_00 is the GMT time in HH_MM_SS format, 2017 is the year, madbeach is the camera location, c1 is the camera number, and bright is the image type. The UserComment EXIF metadata field was used to store the camera intrinsics and extrinsics in the image metadata. The UserComment has a nested dictionary structure. The highest-level dictionary contains two nested dictionaries as well as a note explaining the structure of the UserComment field. One nested dictionary contains the actual intrinsic and extrinsic data variables. The other nested dictionary contains text descriptions for each of the variables in the dictionary of data variables. To read out the imagery header information to a CSV file the command is: 'exiftool -csv *.jpg > allheaders.csv'. Specific tags may be specified with this command, if preferred.

A total of 17,826 Joint Photographic Experts Group (JPEG) images are included in this release (c1_MadeiraBeachFL_ImageProducts) and can be viewed and downloaded on the Imagery Data System (IDS), https://cmgds.marine.usgs.gov/idsviewer/data_release/10.5066-P9SGRTF1. The images on the IDS are sorted by default from newest to oldest date collected and can also be browsed by collection (image type), “snap”, “timex”, “var”, “bright”, and “dark”. The complete collection or a select subset of the images can be downloaded from the IDS. An example subset of this image collection can be downloaded from the data release webpage (c1_MadeiraBeachFL_ImageProducts_exampleImagery.zip).