• General

    Welcome to the EUMETSAT Marine Essentials Pack training page!

    Snapshot of globe with CHL


    Through this online learning platform called Moodle, you will find a range of educational resources aimed at helping you gain the skills required to become comfortable, independent and adept at:

    • Understanding the data and data products that the CMDS provides (timeliness, resolution, data formats, variables).
    • Selecting most relevant and appropriate products from the CMDS for specific tasks.
    • Accessing/downloading data and products provided in the CMDS.
    • Knowing how to work with CMDS data in SNAP and Python (Jupyter Notebooks).
    • Applying the satellite data products from the CMDS for tailored applications.
    We will introduce you to the Copernicus Marine Data Stream (CMDS), provide you with the background knowledge of the Copernicus programme, satellites and instrumentation, data access and formats, and tools and software necessary to begin working with this data for marine applications.

    This online training is designed to 'stand alone' without the addition of virtual classrooms, so we ask that you please direct any questions or queries to helpdesk@eumetsat.int with 'Marine Essentials Pack' in the subject line.


    ◄Learning how to access CMDS dataSNAP videos in Spanish►

    Downloading SNAP for Visualising data.

    • Downloading SNAP for Visualising data.

      What is SNAP?

      The European Space Agency (ESA) have developed a series of toolboxes for working with data from the Sentinel satellites. These can be downloaded from the Sentinel Toolbox Exploitation Platform (STEP).

      Functionalities of SNAP that we will explore together will primarily involve image display and navigation, mask definition and display, band arithmetic, and spectral view. However, there are many more functionalities, including:
      • Layer management to view and manipulate multiple product layers as well as images from WMS servers/ESRI shape files.
      • Subsetting and exporting to different file formats.
      • Plots and statistics for defined regions of interest.
      • Graph Processing Framework (GPF): for creating user-defined processing chains.
      • Reprojection and ortho-rectification to a variety of map projections.
      • Geo-coding and rectification using ground control point.
      • Multithreading and Multi-core processor support.

      How do I get SNAP installed on my computer?
      SNAP is available for Windows, Mac and UNIX systems. To download and install, just follow the following steps or watch the video below:
      1. Visit this page and select the download of the Sentinel Toolboxes suitable for your operating system.
      2. Open the downloaded file and follow the installation instructions. You can opt to only install the toolboxes you want. For this course you will only need the Sentinel-3 toolbox, but you may wish to install all. If you wish to install other toolboxes after the initial installation you can follow the guidelines here to install from within SNAP.
      3. Once installed, open the software by clicking on the icon in your relevant install location (e.g. in ‘All Programs’ in Windows, ‘Applications’ in Mac, or the equivalent dependent on your UNIX system). You can also open from the command line, information on the SNAP command line interfaces is here.
      4. We recommend you update all the plugins once installed. You can do this from the top menu under Help>Check for updates.


      Did you know?

      The Sentinel Application Platform (SNAP) also supports numerous sensors beyond the Sentinels (Including MERIS, MODIS, Landsat8). Though SeaDAS (developed by NASA) has a similar graphical user interface, SNAP builds on the legacy of the VISAT BEAM software developed for use with data from the ENVISAT satellite.


      Now, we will show you how to make the most of the SNAP toolboxes in order to visualise your Sentinel-3 OLCI and SST data

      SNAP screenshot

      Your introduction to using SNAP
      In this video, Ana demonstrates how to visualise Level-1 OLCI data using a number of tools, including colour manipulation, pin manager and spectrum view.


      ◄Learning how to access CMDS dataSNAP videos in Spanish►