EO: Clouds from both sides now

[neufer]

<<Looking up from the ground or a boat, we can pick out distinctive cloud shapes, even decide which pets or farm animals clouds might resemble. But satellites, which observe clouds from above and view thousands of square kilometers at once, can detect complex cloud patterns that aren’t obvious on a human scale. As satellite observations have accumulated, our understanding of cloud forms has grown. Among the interesting cloud patterns visible at the satellite scale are open- and closed-cell stratocumulus clouds.>>


Discovering the 3D Mandelbulb

• • Hamlet > Act III, scene II
  
  HAMLET: Do you see yonder cloud that's almost in shape of a camel?
  
  LORD POLONIUS: By the mass, and 'tis like a camel, indeed.
  
  HAMLET: Methinks it is like a weasel.
  
  LORD POLONIUS: It is backed like a weasel.
  
  HAMLET: Or like a whale?
  
  LORD POLONIUS: Very like a whale.

[bystander]

Clouds as a Patchwork Quilt

Like designs in a quilt, actinoform clouds stand out against a larger backdrop of cloud cover. In August 2001,
the Multi-angle Imaging SpectroRadiometer (MISR) took this picture of actinoform clouds in the Southern
Hemisphere. (Image courtesy NASA / GSFC / LaRC / JPL, MISR Team)

Featured in a MISR Mystery Image Quiz in March 2005, this image shows an actinoform cloud from space.
(Image courtesy NASA / GSFC / LaRC / JPL, MISR Team)

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) operated a series of satellites in the Television
Infrared Observation Satellite Program (TIROS) in the 1960s. These satellites captured several images of
actinoform clouds. Images shown here were taken on August 16, 1962 (far left); October 7, 1962 (second
from left and center); and July 18, 1964 (second from right and far right).