Cyclone Center Talk

How to classify an image

  • Knappster by Knappster scientist

    Classifying an image can seem daunting, especially when viewing a storm for the first time. Here's a short summary on how I decide on what to call an image:

    Does the image have an eye? [Is there a warm region surrounded by a mostly circular colder region?]
    If so, select eye.

    Is there a large mostly circular region of cold clouds in the center? If so, it is likely embedded center.

    Is the cold cloud structure not circular? Does it look squished on one side? Then that is likely shear.

    If you've reached this point, then it is likely curved band or other.

    Curved bands generally have plenty of cold clouds, just not as organized as the above systems.
    No storm is very little cold clouds.
    Post tropical is at the end of a system after you've classified a few. It can also look like shear (but post tropical clouds are often warmer).

    Does this help you out?

    Posted

  • Charkersh9 by Charkersh9

    Yeah, most of it does, but once I got one picture that was a little zoomed in, and I could not see the edges.
    What do I do if I cannot move on and I don't know how to classify it?
    Other than that, I love this project! It is fairly easy to do, and I really like how when we scroll down
    we can see more about our classifications.
    ~Charlotte

    Posted

  • peterthorne by peterthorne moderator

    Hi Charlotte, when you get a picture like that you can either give it a best shot or choose 'Edge' or 'no storm' under the 'other tab'. Just from your description of the image you had it was probably either embedded or, given lack of apparent structure 'no storm'.

    Posted

  • Zeddidiah by Zeddidiah

    I am very frustrated in my attempts to classify. I need many good examples of storms with proper classifications to view so I might tune my eyes to this task. Is there a catalog of classified storms available? I found the tutorial to be very incomplete

    Posted

  • peterthorne by peterthorne moderator

    Hi Zeddidiah, sorry for delay in responding. The catalog of classified storms is a good idea and one I'll raise with the team. However, please don't be disheartened. There are many images that are hard to classify and there are disagreements even amongst experts over. So long as everyone takes their best imformed estimate we can use the spread of such estimates in our analysis to highlight the uncertain images.

    Posted

  • cch001 by cch001 scientist

    Zeddidiah, I can send you a bunch of examples of classified images so you can see what others have thought. Would this be helpful?

    Posted