Week 13 & 14: Slump

Writing:
The last two weeks saw virtually no progress as far as writing is concerned. This is in part due to preparations and attendance of a three-day workshop in Week 14, as well as the arrival of a new interferometry software and some subsequent testing. If I have to be honest, however, it was just plain lack of focus. There are now only 3 weeks left of my full-time writing time on Réunion, and I plan to do it as badly as needs be, as long as it gets done. The aim is still to finish all 9 methodology sections before 17 December 2009. Wish me luck! It's getting tight.

Week 12: One down

Writing:
Finished change vector analysis section. Gully monitoring section was interrupted by an all-night volcano-watching expedition and subsequent recovery.

Week 11: Scribbles

Research:
Finished!

Writing:
Started writing on the change vector analysis chapter. Managed in total around seven pages of text, which is not really enough. But hey, it's moving along, and it's very satisfying to see my hard work taking shape on paper.
To infinity and beyond!

Week 10: Wrap it up

Research:

Refined the shadow altimetry to work even when using oblique photos. Performed a multiple-scale DEM subtraction on my stereo DEM's to view the effect of resolution on volume calculations. Re-tested the accuracy of my 2006 and 2008 DEM's (correctly this time), and was delighted to find that the accuracy was even better that I thought - very nice. And that, as they say, is that! :-) The end of my analyses. Woohoo!

Writing:

Spent some time building a workable structure for the thesis - something that would flow logically while presenting the research in a scientifically sound way (thanks to Nicolas for suggesting the split into 3 parts, makes much more sense that way). Wasted a little time on this, for fear of the unkown that lies beyond :-)

At this point there are seven weeks left for me on Réunion, and I aim to write as much as possible of the actual science while I am here. I will have a month and a half in South Africa in which I can edit and refine and rewrite everything to make it flow, but it is imperative that I get as much as possible on paper before then. Wish me luck. Two-Ten has dwindled to One-Forty Two (!)

Week 9 1/2: Beginning of the End

Just a short note to say that I have just ticked off the last analysis task for my PhD. As of tomorrow, I am officially writing full time. With 120 days (4 months) to go until I have to hand in my thesis, it's gonna be quite a race!

Week 9: "What a great day for science"

Research:

Week was very instructive and productive. Finished the change vector analysis on Landsat in the Eastern Cape with very satisfying results. After that I re-tackled my semi-experimental shadow altimetry technique and finally got it to work which, of course, prompted me into a little dance of joy! (Yes, I know...) Next week is the official start of my full-time writing. One or two small analysis task (mostly accuracy assesment) will spill over into next week, and I might have to go do an hour or two of GPS measurements in the river, but I am pretty much done. I have to stop sometime, otherwise I will go on ad infinitum...

Writing:

Next week, baby, next week

Week 8: Landsat

Research:
Spent the week first learning, and then applying preprocessing and calibration of Landsat 5 and 7 imagery for change vector analysis (DN to radiance to reflectance, atmospheric correction, topographic normalization, relative radiometric normalization etc). Interesting stuff. Having some trouble with artifacts from Erdas Model Maker, but working on that. Next week is the last week of analyses before the Big Write starts - intense.

Writing:
None... yet

Week 7: Chasing cars

Research:
Finished the orthorectification of 1953 aerial photos in the three key areas defined in South Africa for the mapping of gully extension. Having done that, I realized that I had no real plan as to do with them - much like a dog having finally caught the car he was chasing. Experimented with ways to extract gully characteristics stereographically. Weekly meeting with supervisor was good, but more focussed on external data sources etc. Performed some validation of the 2008 DEM I constructed using stereophotogrammetry by comparing it to a LIDAR campaign, and the results are encouraging (except of course that it took the LIDAR a few seconds to do what took me a month). Anywaaay.....

Writing:
Still postponed until next week, when the last of my analyses will be finished.

Week 6: Gully hunting

Research:
Finally received the camera calibration reports from CDSM, so the process of orthorectifying historical aerial photography of the Eastern Cape commenced. Had a productive meeting with my supervisor, and he did me the favour of setting 14 October as the final deadline for my PhD analysis. After that it is full-time writing all the way. Spent the rest of the week orthorectifying. The bitch is that even a decent orthorectification in Erdas always has a few meters of RMS error, so some spline rubbersheeting is necessary to fit the areas of interest to exactly the right spot. Takes loooong and is booooring.

Writing:
No writing again this week. Think I will just use all my time to process imagery until 14 October, and then get to writing again.

Week 5: Photogrammetry

Research:
The principal goal of the week was to build a stereo DEM of an area north of Matatiele. First try gave dubious results because I didn't initialize the stereo pair with the true calibration parameters. Phoned the Chief Directorate: Surveys & Mappings in Cape Town, and the promised to send me the calibration reports, which of course, they didn't. Even after repeated email requests. Angry about that.

So the rest of the week kinda slowed down from there. Prepared for, and performed more aerial photography of Rivieres de Galets from a small aircraft. The planning paid off, and the images are beautiful and at a very acceptable resolution. Further, identified areas of gully erosion in the South African study area that will be studied using time-series analysis. Also had a very positive meeting with my supervisor, and we decided on a list of candidates for my PhD jury. Exciting stuff.

Writing:
Again, zip. Not good.

Week 4: Riviere des Remparts

Research
This week was dedicated primarily to starting (and finishing!) a section of my PhD that deals with erosion in Riviere des Remparts on the south east coast. Lots of back-&-forthing between conflicting projections & vertical coordinate systems, but finally some interesting results. Also tackled a enormous box filled with (what I thought would be) an eternity of manual data entry from company reports - turns out only two or three reports deal with Riviere des Remparts. Suspect somebody stole a key report, but no way to prove it... meh.

Identified one (of probably a few) case study areas for gully erosion in the Eastern Cape. Started consolidating the historical aerial photography for that area. Mosaicked the 2001 images to serve as reference set and constructed a 20m DEM from 1:50 000 contours.

Did a test-flight of the new version of the Poivilliers software and it works like a charm. Communication with the developer also ironed out some zooming issues. Next week will see a brand spanking new DEM of Matatiele as it looked in 1955...

Writing
Zip.

Week 3: Fragmentation

Research:
Spent largest part of the week (apart from some administrative nonsense) preparing data for stereophotogrammetry on the 2003 dataset (selecting GCP's, registering images - learning HOW to register images with fiducial marks). Performed preliminary elevation extraction and (after several accuracy tests) encountered a 3.6m vertical offset in the data - undoubtedly linked to the obscure French datum used to collect the input data - have to either subtract the average error, or find a way to convert between datums. Image size also too big for software to handle (it's never easy, is it?). Software developer promised to send updated version of software next week which will solve a lot of problems and provide a much larger amount of automation. Have decided to let everything stew until I get the new version.

Writing
Slow, as always, but getting there. Felt like I was breaking through the barrier of my own perfectionism for the first time this week. Pretty much finished the "Research Problem and Aims" section of Chapter 1. Would have liked to achieve more, but it's ok. At least I am gaining momentum.

Week 2: Slooow

Research:
Finished interferometry processing. Layerstacked and PCA'd results to aid in decisionmaking. Narrowed down area of interest for South African multi-temporal study based on interferometry results. Prepared data & calibration reports for stereo processing of 2003 Reunion aerial photography but ran into software issues. Contacted "tech support".

I am purposely not going into the details of the research I am doing since there is an amount of intellectual capital involved, and I don't want to give everyting away on the internet :-)

Writing:
Didn't write enough. Read the three seminal works that will support Chapter 1, but only wrote few sentences of "Problem statement" section. Fell into the trap of trying to write and edit at the same time instead of just writing. Have to get over this.

Week 1: Small step for man

Research:
Been processing ERS, ALOS and ASAR interferometry this week and creating derivative products. Updated the existing DEM of Réunion with a more up-to-date one to assist in correct geocoding of radar imagery (which necessitated redoing a lot of the inteferometry). Studied the concept of interferometric coherence (still some stuff I don't understand, but getting there).

Writing:
Not much, having only decided yesterday that the time for writing is NOW and not "later". So (embarassingly) belatedly, I have written the first sentence of my PhD today - as in sentence 1, chapter 1. After much deliberation about where one should actually start a PhD (some are of the opinion that chapter one is the last thing you write) I have decided that I need chapter 1 finished and done as soon as possible - if only for my own sanity. And, as always, the "Do it badly, but do it" rule will apply. In fact, I will need to tell myself to "Do it really, really badly, but do it", otherwise I won't ever get anywhere... Damn perfectionism!

Introduction

A warm welcome to visitors, friends and family

Two-Ten is a blog dedicated to the final 30 weeks of my PhD. The defense date has been set for 19 March 2010 - 210 days from today, and one week before my 30th birthday.

Every week, I will write a short update of the progress made during the week, specifically with regards to the writing of the thesis manuscript. View it as an "accountability blog", if you will, and use the comments section to reprimand me if you think I have been slacking (or just use the tick-boxes). For my part it will help to keep me focussed and moving.

Hope to hear from you all soon! First update due tomorrow
Up, up and away!

SJ