The inaugural ASPRS UAS Conference was held October 20-22 in Reno, Nevada, bringing together a diverse group of technologists, pilots, surveyors, vendors and consultants to talk about this emerging technology. 500 attendees and 50 exhibitors were in attendance.
Master of Ceremonies, Lewis Graham of GeoCue, opened with his comments on the importance of miniaturization, connectivity and sensors in the UAS market.
“Miniaturization and connectivity and sensors. Sensors will communicate in intelligent ways, software in background to make that happen,” said Graham. In addition, “Sense and avoid” type of technology/ software makes decisions based on proximity of the aerial system.”
The confluence of miniaturization, guidance and control systems, motors, sensors, on the photogrammetry side, new technologies out of robotic vision, taking point clouds of photos and taking information from this all conspire to bring UAS to the forefront and make it a force to be reckoned with.
Geodesign is a set of techniques and enabling technologies for planning built and natural environments in an integrated process, including project conceptualization, analysis, design specification, stakeholder participation and collaboration, design creation, simulation, and evaluation (among other stages). “Geodesign is a design and planning method which tightly couples the creation of design proposals with impact simulations informed by geographic contexts.”[1] – Wikipedia
As with every release of Safe Software’s spatial data transformation technology FME, the release of FME 2013 Desktop and Server versions offers support for more data formats, in this case over 300 of them, including across point cloud/LiDAR, 3D, raster, database, vector and XML. Notable new formats include the ASTM E57 point cloud format, X3D, Autodesk IMX, PostGIS raster, SpatiaLite, Salesforce, and many more.
On Monday Apple introduced a new version of its mobile operating system for iPhones and iPads that will bring a host of new features, including maps that let users soar over a three-dimensional rendering of a city, according to an article in The New York Times.
As was mentioned in this blog of a pre-announcement of Google Earth for mobile “(Pre-announcement of Google Earth for mobile made at Google event”) last week, the new map software replaces Google data with Apple’s own mapping system. This is a big step for a company that has considered Google a close partner up until now. Since Apple introduced the iPhone, it has relied on Google data to drive the mapping software. When Google released its Android platform, however, relationships between the two companies began to disintegrate. Not surprisingly as Android is the top mobile operating system in the world, putting Apple and Google head to head in several different markets.
Welcome to our new offering, the GISCafe Voice. This is a new editorial blog-type content that will provide more timely coverage of breaking news to be posted two-three times per week. The articles will provide rich editorial content on topics important to GIS and geospatial professionals, including conference coverage, coverage of geospatial being used in emergency response and disaster recovery, and new products and trends that shape the industry.
Why the GISCafe Voice at this time?
We’re noticing that as geospatial information and geographic information systems become more pervasive, they are becoming critical in more industries than ever before. They are a part of the defense military and homeland security departments, tracking and identification of weather systems such as hurricanes , tsunamis, floods and earthquakes. Organizations without large GIS departments still need access to GIS information which is possible now with technologies that allow individuals to view, markup and access GIS information on the internet or in the cloud. Crowdsourcing has added another dimension to GIS and geospatial, opening up the technology to anyone who wants to contribute current information about an event, community or disaster.
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