What things did you learn or relearn?

What questions came to my mind and what were my attempts to answer these questions?

Remote sensing is the science and art of acquiring information about an object, area, or phenomenon
through the analysis of data acquired by a device that is not in contact with the object, area, or
phenomenon under investigation. (Lillesand and Kiefer) This is done through sensing and recording
reflected or emitted energy and processing, analyzing, and applying that information. Essentially, what I
learned is that remote sensing is the science, and at some point, an art of obtaining information about
the Earth's surface without literally being in contact with it; and what I learned from previous lecture is
that remote sensing is a matter of acquiring, processing and interpreting.

Other information I also acquired on the readings is that there are a lot of scope of the field of remote
sensing that can be expanded by probing its history to make track of the development of its
fundamental concepts. Prior to airplane, early photography and aerial images were the starting point of
the practice of Remote Sensing. The use of powered aircraft as platforms for aerial photography
established the succeeding breakthrough, followed by the significance of aerial photography for military
reconnaissance and surveillance during the World War I. During the interwar years, the integration of
the camera and the airplane progressed, as did institutionalization of aerial photography in government
and industry; in World War II, the use of electromagnetic spectrum was extended as well as the aerial
intelligence; and in Cold War Era, strategic photointerpretation were utilized. By the late 1950s, aerial
photography was applied in government and civil society as a source of cartographic information, in
1972, the launching of Landsat 1 scored another milestone as it was used to observed the Earth’s land
areas. In present times, Google Earth and other similar online services represents new form of remote
sensing.

In remote sensing, the process involves, initially, the physical objects that are wished to be examined,
then the sensor data that were formed when an instrument viewed the physical object, followed by the
extracted information that are the interpretations of the data, and lastly, the applications where the
analyzed remote sensing data can be combined to other data to deal with practical problems.

One question that arised from my readings, since images that are remotely sensed are observed from
above the earth, what makes it advantageous and helpful for many purposes? As for me, I considered
the above or overhead view as beneficial for the reason that it covers large areas, and therefore it can
identify large features. Inaccessible areas or regions that are captured by remote sensing can be
obtained and studied, as well as generated data from above can be used for land-use planning, other
geological surveys or even disaster management.

Another query for career preparation, what would be the work flow of a remote sensing practitioner?
Trying to answer the question, I think GIS and other related systems and software are important in the
workplace. Required skills and perspectives are supplemental to the workflow in order to effectively and
appropriately use spatial data in the field of remote sensing.