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Our spotlight this month is on the EarthData group. EarthData International, with its headquarters
in the USA, is the nucleus of the EarthData group but the group has several affiliates and associates as well as strategic international
partners in Europe, the Middle East and Latin America that allow it to offer its services on a global basis. EarthData is a strong advocate
of the benefits of airborne laser mapping, having been involved with prototype sensors based on the technology as early as 1985. Today,
as part of their full range of airborne imaging, mapping, and Geographic Information Systems (GIS) services, EarthData collects information
about the earth’s surface using a variety of airborne sensors including a laser sensing system (lidar) which is a customised version
of Azimuth Corporation's standard AeroScan system, operating to 20,000´ with a FOV of up to 75º and capturing up to 5 returns
per pulse. The company transforms these multiple sensor data sets into customised mapping and GIS products and services for its clients.
While the entire EarthData group specialises in numerous areas of spatial data acquisition, development and analysis, their airborne
laser mapping capability is offered through EarthData Technologies. Located in Hagerstown, MD, USA, Earth Data Technologies develops airborne
cameras and sensors as well as processing technologies to improve the production of mapping and GIS data sets and expand the data applications
available to EarthData's clients. In addition to their lidar system, the company's current suite of cameras and sensors includes traditional
black and white, natural colour, and infrared aerial cameras, a microwave radiometer, thermal sensors, multispectral and digital cameras
and a low-altitude mapping system. EarthData Aviation is the airborne data acquisition arm of the group.
EarthData stresses two main themes in marketing their lidar services:
Innovation
EarthData has been at the forefront of mapping technology throughout its history. Over the past decade, the company was a leader in the
development of digital orthophotography and softcopy photogrammetry. EarthData has helped pioneer the integration of airborne GPS and
inertial measurement technologies with light detection and ranging (lidar) laser terrain modelling systems optimised for fixed-wing aerial
mapping applications. The company’s AeroScan lidar system, thermal sensors, and microwave radiometers, can be integrated in a variety
of combinations to produce the customised geographic data each client needs. Efforts to complement current capabilities with additional
airborne data acquisition technologies include the GeoSAR radar mapping program and the development of a large format digital multispectral
camera system for more rapid image acquisition and interpretation for environmental, land use and land cover applications. The company
has recently deployed a de Havilland Twin Otter aircraft with multiple sensors and processors onboard to conduct advanced research in
sensor integration. There are some details of their lidar sensor and related projects online;
we especially liked the airborne lidar data of the Pentagon. Wonder if they let them know they were being scanned with a laser?.
Advanced Processing Software
Advanced processing software is equally important to the proper deployment and operation of an advanced airborne laser mapping system.
EarthData continuously develops and refines software techniques to facilitate geographic analyses based on the data from its new sensors.
For example, by working with the unique data characteristics of the lidar terrain model, EarthData has developed proprietary vegetation
and man-made feature identification and removal algorithms as well as complex three-dimensional modelling techniques. Incorporated into
the data sets delivered to clients, these techniques add to the knowledge clients need to make land use and natural resource management
decisions. Examples of several applications are available online including --- Corridor
Mapping of Transmission Lines
EarthData has several affiliates and associates as well as several strategic international partnerships in Europe, the Middle East and
Latin America including:
- Calgis, Inc. a wholly owned subsidiary of EarthData based in Fresno, CA, and responsible for
radar mapping for the EarthData group. Calgis is working with NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory and the California Department of Conservation
to develop an airborne radar mapping system known as GeoSAR that will be able to map above as well as beneath the foliage. The system
is mounted on the company's Gulfstream II jet and is expected to collect data at a rate of about 160 square kilometres per minute.
- Towill, Inc. an associate of the EarthData group, offers a full breadth of survey, mapping and
GIS services. Land and hydrographic surveys, geodetic control networks, and utility surveys are performed using GPS or a combination
of GPS and traditional survey techniques. Large scale topographic and digital orthophoto maps are prepared using analytical stereo-plotters
and softcopy photogrammetric workstations. Towill is also developing data sets from EarthData's lidar system.
- Spencer B. Gross, Inc. is another major associate of the EarthData group. Operating in the Pacific
Northwest and around the USA, Portland-based Spencer B. Gross, Inc. (SBG), specialises in quality photogrammetric mapping and off-the-shelf
digital databases. The company provides airborne GPS, aerotriangulation, analytical and softcopy compilation, precision scanning, digital
orthphoto production, and in conjunction with EarthData, lidar mapping. SBG recently posted copies of several presentations on the implementation
of airborne laser mapping within their survey business. The presentations cover such topics as Development of A Bare Ground DEM and
Canopy Layer In NW Forestlands Using High-Performance lidar and a topic that is of growing interest to the data end-users, Q/A
& Q/C for Acquiring and Processing Lidar Data. Details can be found in the section Lidar
Technology at Spencer B. Gross. The presentations are large PowerPoint files but include informative facts and sample data sets
outlining the "newest technology at SBG". Worth reviewing unless you are stuck with a 28.8k connection. There is also an online
article on the site entitled Applications
of Advanced Lidar for DEM Generation that is worth reviewing. SBG also has more complete details of the AeroScan airborne laser
system online.
International partners of the EarthData group include:
- BKS Surveys, Ltd. (United Kingdom)
BKS is the UK's largest independent aerial survey and digital mapping company. BKS specialises in the creation of spatial data, combining
people, technology and services to create solutions for a diversity of challenges. Based in the town of Coleraine, on the North Coast
of Northern Ireland, the company, founded 1956, has prospered through an ability to adapt and innovate. Traditionally an aerial survey
company, BKS has expanded and developed its operational requirements so that today the company employs 125 people and is recognised
as the UK's largest independent digital mapping company offering that one-stop solution. BKS's services and technologies add a new dimension
to images and data so as to enable engineers, planners, managers, agriculturists and geologists to manage and access information more
effectively.
- Aeroterra (Argentina)
If your Spanish is better then ours .....
- Sofia (Mexico)
(No web link that we have been able to find.)
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