ROBERT WELLMAN CAMPBELL

School of Mines, 1956-2024

Sometimes landscapes turn over completely— not one stone unturned, not one pixel recognizable. Here is one, an almost lost landscape, a photo now locatable only indirectly through intermediaries. Can't see there from here. A typical case of American blind rephotography.

Seven-photo sequence of construction at the South Dakota School of Mines and Technology in Rapid City.

Gobstoppers, Cents and Vaporware

"If we are going to do mass rephoto­graphy— that is, if we are going to reconstruct the Earth's landscape through time at our native resolu­tion— we need to learn many lessons about organizing those millions of photographs."

Online article with ground / aerial / satellite image demo, in peer review.

Old Main, 1887-2023

In this symbolic heart of the campus, St. Olaf College used to form circles, holding hands and making these charming, democratic photos that curved as far as a Cirkut Camera could turn.

Photo web stitching and reshooting Prof. Ole Felland.

FramFrom: St. Olaf Drafting Upward

A rephotography cartography pro­ject by students in GIS, St. Olaf College, January 2023.

The KMZ file opens in Google Earth Pro (free here), and posters open in a browser. Photos are also posted as "compilations" at re.photos. Their main projects were maps on the themes of their choosing.

St. Mary's Hall, 1916-2022

1916 was the semicentennial of this school in Faribault, Minn. 2022 was the post-COVID all-class reunion of Shattuck-St. Mary's, its co-ed successor.

A moving two-date panorama; read the card for instructions.

A Field on Fire: The Future of Environ­mental History

"These essays in honor of pioneer environmental historian Donald Worster are eye-openers." (Choice Reviews) Robb Campbell's chapter restarts environ­mental history with the fact that humans live in the sky.

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Landstand: A Ground Remote Sensing Archive

Landcover image­ry from satellites went through the looking-glass from thousands of downloads to millions. Near-ground imagery is stuck in the mud. Here's how to fix it.

Two academic talks given at USGS EROS in 2008 and 2012, at YouTube.

Wishlist: Wilderness Endgame in the Black Hills National Forest

Tracking four roadless areas through the 1970s RARE II process for Wilder­ness designation. Which will make it?

Journal article, 2010, open access at the University of Nebraska - Lincoln Digital Commons.

Earthshots: Satellite Images of Environ­mental Change

In 1996 I put the USGS's Historical Landsat Data Comparisons online as Earthshots. Before-and-after Land­sat images of dramatic changes.

Website of articles, 8th edition here; current edition at eros.usgs.gov/earthshots.

Whereinthe­Hills.com

An early draft of a ground-photo archive, funded by the Upper Midwest Aerospace Consortium. Lots of photos of the Black Hills.

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The University of Kansas landscape

Articles in, for, and from This Week in KU History. "One Day In The Park With George," 2003. "The Vision Thing," 2003. "What We Need: A Long and Winding Road", 2005. Unbelievably the University had no map of the whole campus, so we made one.

A Haskell-Baker Bibliography

"A Haskell-Baker Bibliography," a project of local environmental history researching two square miles of Lawrence, Kansas. Completed by the students of History 562, Environmental History of the 20th-Century U.S., University of Kansas, spring 2002.

South Dakota Vegetation Terms on Maps

Online article of maps repeating August Kuchler's study of Kansas, but two states up. 1997.

Tour these projects at Google Earth

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