CosmiQ Works’ first project exploring the intersection of emerging machine learning techniques and remote sensing data focused on maritime ship detection and characterization as the primary research application. The project focused on the foundational elements ranging from data labeling techniques and taxonomies to performance evaluation between legacy machine learning models and emerging deep learning models. Furthermore, we used the project to quantify the impact of image resolution on existing objection detection algorithms. This foundational project helped influence a variety of other CosmiQ projects or collaborations including the development and release of our own open source deep learning workflow designed  specifically for satellite images.