The Planetary Eye: Turning Earth Into a Giant, Distributed Camera

Idea; 240,720

TL;DR: I’m building a solar-powered camera module that mounts to tall structures (think light poles and power poles), works for cities by day (parking/security data) and for the cosmos by night (deep-sky imaging). Synced together, millions of modules become a planetary “retina” that can see the sky with unprecedented detail.

Why This? Why Now?

We already put sensors everywhere—for traffic, weather, and ads. What if those same posts, towers, rooftops, and wind turbines also became pixels in a planet-scale eye? By day, the network funds itself through useful urban services. By night, it flips upward to do computational astronomy—stacking, aligning, and fusing simultaneous exposures from around the world to reveal the faint universe.

The Core Idea (aka “Planetary Eye”)

Solar-powered module that mounts on any tall thing (light poles, rooftops, towers, turbines).
Two modes:
Day Mode (downward) via a small periscope/vanity-mirror: parking, security, traffic, pedestrian analytics.
Night Mode (upward): stars, satellites, deep-sky objects.
One global clock: each module time-stamps exposures to microseconds for clean alignment.
Edge + Cloud: smart on-device compression/filters; global stitching for research-grade images.
Open science at night; commercial utility by day.

Think of each module as a rod/cone in Earth’s retina.

What This Is (and the Words for It)

If you’re wondering what to call the tech:

Computational imaging & super-resolution (many images → one higher-res image)
Interferometry-inspired thinking (synchronizing many instruments)
Global synchronized exposure (simultaneous shutters + precise timing)
Wide-baseline fusion (using Earth’s size as an effective aperture)

Working name: Planetary Eye (other ideas: Earthscope, Gaia Eye, Planetary Retina Project).

How It Works

Hardware (Module v1)

Camera sensor: high-sensitivity, low-noise CMOS (mono preferred for night SNR; optional color Bayer for day).
Optics: swappable lens; compact periscope/mirror to point down in daylight without moving the whole housing.
Timebase: GPS-disciplined oscillator (PPS) for sub-millisecond sync.
Compute: low-power MCU + edge AI (denoise, compression, object detection).
Comms: LTE-M / NB-IoT or LoRaWAN for low-bit telemetry; Wi-Fi/5G where available.
Power: panel + MPPT + LiFePO₄ pack; ultra-low-power idle; tamper & weather seals (IP65+).
Mounting: universal clamp/strap kit for poles, rails, parapets, and mast arms.

Software (Edge → Cloud)

Edge: noise/blur screening, region-of-interest cropping, metadata packing (time, GPS, pointing, sky quality).
Sync: shutters triggered at agreed epochs (UTC).
Transport: prioritized uploads; daytime commercial data local; night science frames queued.
Fusion: global service aligns/warps frames, performs calibration (flat/dark), stacks, super-res, and publishes maps & catalogs.
APIs: daytime analytics API (parking counts, occupancy heatmaps); night-sky tiles API (public/open).

Daytime = Revenue (Funding the Science)

Parking space detection (count, occupancy, turnover, enforcement assist)
Traffic & safety analytics (vehicle flow, near-miss detection, pedestrian counts)
Perimeter/security augmentation for campuses, ports, logistics yards
Environmental signals (smoke, haze, particulate visibility proxies)

Privacy first: privacy masking at the edge, retention controls, and clear opt-outs. The night-sky data is open.

Nighttime = Science (Open by Default)

Deep-sky mapping via global stacking (faint nebulae, dwarf galaxies)
Near-Earth object & debris tracking
Satellite trains & light-pollution monitoring
Citizen science: anyone can browse sky tiles and contribute modules

Business & Governance

B2B/B2G daytime subscriptions → recurring revenue.
Nighttime open data → institutional partnerships (universities, observatories), grants, sponsorships.
Hardware model: buy, lease, or revenue-share for host sites.
Trust layer: privacy board + open science council; transparent policies.

Roadmap

Prototype Phase (0–3 months)

One module prototype with solar, GPS-PPS timing, LTE-M, edge preprocessing.
Micro-pilot: 3–5 rooftops in one city; validate parking counts vs ground truth.
Night trials: synchronized exposures across two sites, first stacked image.

Pilot Network (4–9 months)

100–300 modules in a metro; daytime API to a parking operator/city partner.
Night: scheduled global sync nights with community builders.

Regional Scale (10–18 months)

5–10k modules; standardized mounts; revised sensor for better QE.
Night: sky tiles & public viewer; first peer-reviewed results.

Global Scale (18+ months)

International partners; open data commons; developer ecosystem.

Open Questions (Help Wanted)

Best sensor/lens compromise for dual-use (day vs faint sky)?
Optimal mirror/periscope geometry for tiny, durable day-mode views?
Compression strategies that preserve star fields while slashing bandwidth?
Community governance + privacy guardrails across jurisdictions?

Call to Action

I’m assembling pilot hosts, partners, and contributors (hardware, optics, embedded, CV/astro, privacy, city tech). Want in?

Host a module (building owners, campuses, utilities)
Partner (parking, mobility, smart-city, space)
Contribute (EE/ME/firmware, CV/astro-pipelines, policy/privacy)

Contact me or use the form below.

FAQ

Is this a telescope?
Not a single telescope—more like a synchronized, global computational camera.

What about privacy?
Daytime feeds use on-device redaction/masking and short retention; aggregate metrics leave the device. Night data is sky-only and open.

Why a “high-end clock”?
Precise timestamps enable clean global stacking, like beating noise with perfect sync.

Won’t clouds ruin it?
Clouds are local; the array is global. We weight clear-sky frames more in the stack.

Is this profitable?
Daytime analytics can be, which cross-subsidizes the open night science.

Contact & Updates

Have a roof, a pole, or a partnership idea?

Email me • LinkedIn • Twitter/X

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Working title: Planetary Eye
Version: 0.1 Concept Note