Geostationary Satellite View

The geos projection pictures how a geostationary satellite scans the earth at regular scanning angle intervals.

Classification	Azimuthal
Available forms	Forward and inverse, spherical and ellipsoidal
Defined area	Global
Alias	geos
Domain	2D
Input type	Geodetic coordinates
Output type	Projected coordinates

proj-string: +proj=geos +h=35785831.0 +lon_0=-60 +sweep=y

Usage

In order to project using the geos projection you can do the following:

proj +proj=geos +h=35785831.0

The required argument h is the viewing point (satellite position) height above the earth.

The projection coordinate relate to the scanning angle by the following simple relation:

scanning_angle (radians) = projection_coordinate / h

Note on sweep angle

The viewing instrument on-board geostationary satellites described by this projection have a two-axis gimbal viewing geometry. This means that the different scanning positions are obtained by rotating the gimbal along a N/S axis (or y) and a E/W axis (or x).

In the image above, the outer-gimbal axis, or sweep-angle axis, is the N/S axis (y) while the inner-gimbal axis, or fixed-angle axis, is the E/W axis (x).

This example represents the scanning geometry of the Meteosat series satellite. However, the GOES satellite series use the opposite scanning geometry, with the E/W axis (x) as the sweep-angle axis, and the N/S (y) as the fixed-angle axis.

The sweep argument is used to tell PROJ which on which axis the outer-gimbal is rotating. The possible values are x or y, y being the default. Thus, the scanning geometry of the Meteosat series satellite should take sweep as y, and GOES should take sweep as x.

Parameters

Required

+h=<value>

Height of the view point above the Earth and must be in the same units as the radius of the sphere or semimajor axis of the ellipsoid.

Optional

+sweep=<axis>

Sweep angle axis of the viewing instrument. Valid options are "x" and "y".

Defaults to "y".

+lon_0=<value>

Central meridian/longitude of natural origin, longitude of origin or longitude of false origin (naming and meaning depend on the projection method).

Defaults to 0.0.

Note

The default convention is to interpret this value as decimal degrees. To specify radians instead, follow the value with the "r" character.

Example: +lon_0=1.570796r

See Projection Units for more information.

+R=<value>

Radius of the sphere, given in meters. If used in conjunction with +ellps, +R takes precedence.

See Ellipsoid size parameters for more information.

+ellps=<value>

The name of a built-in ellipsoid definition.

See Ellipsoids for more information, or execute proj -le for a list of built-in ellipsoid names.

Defaults to "GRS80".

+x_0=<value>

False easting, easting at false origin or easting at projection centre (naming and meaning depend on the projection method). Always in meters.

Defaults to 0.0.

+y_0=<value>

False northing, northing at false origin or northing at projection centre (naming and meaning depend on the projection method). Always in meters.

Defaults to 0.0.