All-sky Visualization Using The Local Analysis and Prediction System (LAPS)

Abstract

The Local Analysis and Prediction (LAPS) system is being used to produce rapid update, high resolution analyses and forecasts of various meteorological fields, including cloud and precipitating hydrometeors. LAPS is highly portable and can be run onsite, particularly when high-resolution and rapid updating is needed. This allows the user to assimilate their own observational data merged with centrally available observations and to set up the analysis/forecast configuration to their liking. The cloud analysis uses satellite (including IR and 1-km resolution visible imagery, updated every 15-min), METARs, radar, aircraft and model first guess information to produce 3-D fields of cloud fraction, cloud liquid, cloud ice, rain, snow, and precipitating ice. This analysis is presently being done by the long-standing, largely sequential data insertion procedure developed within LAPS, though we are presently developing a variational version of this procedure. To help visualize and validate the cloud analysis a ray-tracing procedure was developed to construct simulated all-sky imagery. The visualization procedure efficiently considers various aspects of radiative transfer in clouds, precipitation, aerosols. The terrain is also visualized from vantage points located on the Earth's surface. The all-sky imagery, in either a polar or cylindrical projection can show either analysis or forecast fields. We will present preliminary results of this simulated imagery, along with comparisons to actual CCD images produced by an all-sky camera that is located within our Colorado 1-km resolution domain.