About the National Imagery Management System (NIMS)

Overview

The National Imagery Management System (NIMS) is a comprehensive
infrastructure designed to collect, store, process, and deliver imagery
collected by cameras managed by the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) for
public and scientific use. NIMS supports a wide range of hydrologic and
environmental monitoring applications.

System Architecture

NIMS operates on the USGS Cloud Hosting Solutions Amazon Web Services
(AWS) cloud platform, leveraging a fully serverless architecture to
ensure scalability, reliability, maintainability,and efficiency. Key
components of the system include:

• Centralized Imagery Management – NIMS organizes and stores
  imagery from cameras installed at USGS monitoring locations. It
  provides a simple but effective API for interacting with the system.

• Automated Processing and Delivery – The system utilizes
  serverless processing workflows to enhance efficiency in handling
  large datasets. Imagery processed in NIMS is available for use in
  near real-time and can be queried using the NIMS API.

• Scalability and Performance – NIMS manages vast amounts of image
  data and provides performant access to individual images, camera
  site metadata, and more.

USGS Webcams and Data Integration

Many USGS monitoring locations are equipped with network cameras that
capture still-frame images. These images serve multiple purposes,
including:

• Remote monitoring of water and environmental conditions.

• Verify remote measurements and identify technical issues.

• Supporting visual analyses for hydrologic research and assessment.

USGS monitoring locations with cameras installed can be linked to NIMS
camera sites and configured to upload images directly into NIMS.
Currently, the following mechanisms for getting imagery into NIMS are
supported:

• Pull ingestion – NIMS will ingest camera imagery on a pre-defined
  schedule. This is appropriate for network cameras configured with
  cellular modem telemetry that can serve an image "stream" with
  digest or basic authentication protocols.

• Push ingestion – NIMS will ingest images pushed to the NIMS endpoint
  from authenticated cameras or edge devices with the appropriate
  capabilities. This is suitable for edge computers and some Internet
  of Things (IoT) devices.

• Bulk upload – NIMS will ingest images manually uploaded to the
  system and assigned to a particular camera site. This method is
  suitable for historical site imagery or non-telemetered cameras
  (such as game cameras).

Hydrologic Imagery Visualization and Information System (HIVIS)

The Hydrologic Imagery Visualization and Information System (HIVIS)
is a web application that serves as a primary interface for accessing
imagery managed by NIMS. HIVIS provides:

• Access to tens of millions of image products and time-lapse videos
  from USGS water-resource monitoring sites.

• Interactive map-based visualization of imagery alongside hydrologic
  data.

• Support for scientific research and public decision-making through
  historical and real-time imagery analysis.

HIVIS is publicly accessible at https://apps.usgs.gov/hivis.

For more information, visit the HIVIS Project
Page.

Contact and Support

Please refer to the NIMS API Documentation for technical documentation,
API access, and additional details.

Questions or comments about NIMS services can be directed to
nims@usgs.gov.