Greetings - I'd like to take this opportunity to summarize where various types of mapping data are available for Earth rendering. Here are some examples:

Topography: USGS 900 meter (30 second - global)
USGS 30 meter (1 second - U.S.)
SRTM processed data 90 meter (3 second - global)

Spectral Albedo: Derived from Next Generation Blue Marble RGB imagery - 500 meter resolution

Land Surface Type: USGS 900 meter (30 second - global)

Night Lights: VIIRS 700 meter resolution (supplied as 300-900nm broadband radiance)

these are my bookmarks and things

EarthNightnights
my colored viirs 65536x32768 map
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B6ZYAd08tZ...iew?usp=sharing
238 meg compressed 6 GIG opened

virrs downloads
https://ngdc.noaa.gov/eog/download.html

the 8 bit nightly viirs folders
http://mapserver.ngdc.noaa.gov/viirs/


earth topography
-- there are many

GMTED2010 Global Grids ( what i am using , replaced the old strm1 data)
https://topotools.cr.usgs.gov/gmted_viewer/...lobal_grids.php

STRM 2.1
https://dds.cr.usgs.gov/srtm/version2_1/

the old bluemarble topo folder
http://mirrors.arsc.edu/nasa/topography/

earth textures

the NASA BlueMarble2 500M
http://mirrors.arsc.edu/nasa/world_500m/