Welcome

I’m Carolyn Johnston, founder and principal geospatial data scientist at Johnston Consulting Services, LLC.

What I do

I am a consulting geospatial data scientist. I help small-to-midsize companies, nonprofits, and government solve business problems and develop new technologies that touch on mapping, spatial modeling, and feature extraction from remote sensing imagery.

How I do it

I find new approaches to geospatial data science problems, and lead the way to test them out. I develop new technologies, prototype code, and perform analyses myself, using Python/Tensorflow, scikit-learn, and the Python geospatial stack; in PostGIS; and in R. I am that very experienced R&D lead, and still technically active geospatial data scientist, who is now nearly impossible to hire.

I can provide expertise for new geospatial requirements in groups that do not have a dedicated geospatial staff, and I can help geospatial groups who are struggling to hire knowledgeable leads. I can help non-specialist technical staff develop new and needed skills in this area quickly.

My background at a glance

I hold advanced degrees in statistics and mathematics. For the past 25 years, I’ve been working in research and development, doing machine learning, algorithm development, and technical management in the remote sensing and location-based services industry.

Here are the highlights of my work history:

  • (2020-present) Founder and Principal Geospatial Data Scientist, Johnston Consulting Services, LLC.
  • (2016-2019) Director of Engineering at HERE Technologies, leading teams of research and software engineers developing technology for localizing autonomous vehicles, detecting change in the driven environment, and turning millions of records of vehicle sensor observations into highly accurate map features;
  • (2010-2016) Principal Engineer and Senior Manager with DigitalGlobe, the industry’s leading producer of high-resolution, high-geolocation-accuracy satellite imagery, leading teams to develop solutions for geolocation improvement and image information extraction problems;
  • (2006-2010) Lead Researcher with Microsoft/Bing Local Search, developing streetview geolocation algorithms and solving georeferencing and entity disambiguation problems;
  • (1996-2006) Research Engineer and Director of Software Engineering with Vexcel Corporation, developing remote sensing solutions to large-scale mapping and geospatial problems;
  • (1991-1996) Assistant/Associate professor at Rutgers and Florida Atlantic University, doing research and teaching in pure and applied mathematics.

For a deeper look at my background, please see my Biography Page.

My curriculum vita is also available.

Learn more about JCS’s services here.