Skip to content

Infoterra Nov-Dec News


07 December 2009: Malaysia will task TerraSAR-X Satellite directly

>> Infoterra installs a “Virtual Ground Station” in Kuala Lumpur
>> Malaysian Remote Sensing Agency equipped with order workstation
>> Weather-independent radar satellite data will support flood risk management

Infoterra and its Malaysian partner IMS have now installed a TerraSAR-X Virtual Ground Station at the Malaysian Remote Sensing Agency (MRSA) in Kuala Lumpur: Following the delivery and installation of all necessary technical equipment as well as thorough training on the planning and ordering tool, Nikolaus Faller, Chief Operations Officer of Infoterra GmbH, officially handed the access key to Nik Mazlina Nik Mustapha, Head of Remote Sensing Data Services at MRSA, on Friday, Dec 4.

Read press release in english or german

24 November 2009: Leading Geo-Information Service Providers to Update Federal Digital Landscape Model of Germany

• Infoterra, DELPHI IMM and IABG: working group to update and complete
almost 360,000 square kilometres of geodata

• Main project started in production centres in Potsdam and Dresden

Read press release in english or german

12 November 2009: Imass and Trionics relaunch as Symetri™

The two Autodesk resellers, Imass Design Solutions and Trionics, today relaunched as one business under the name Symetri. The new name and branding was unveiled at a customer conference in Sheffield, following a strategic agreement earlier in the year. Like the former Imass Design Solutions, the newly-formed division is a business unit of Infoterra Ltd, part of EADS Astrium.

View website
Read press release in english

Within the framework of the GMES initiative, ESA is developing a series of ‘Sentinel’ satellites. As part of this development process, the Agency has released a call for Mission Advisory Group members for the Sentinel-4/-5 missions.


Applications can be made via the following website: http://missionadvice.esa.int.
Please note that the deadline for submission is 15 February 2010 (12:00 CET).

Global Monitoring for Environment and Security (GMES) has been established to fulfil the growing need amongst European policy-makers to access accurate and timely information services to better manage the environment, understand and mitigate the effects of climate change and ensure civil security.

Under the leadership of the European Commission, GMES relies largely on data from satellites observing Earth. Hence, ESA – in accordance with the European Space Policy – is developing and managing the Space Component for the initiative.

To ensure the operational provision of Earth-observation data, the Space Component includes the series of five Sentinels missions being developed by ESA specifically for GMES.

Sentinel-4 and Sentinel-5 will provide data for atmospheric composition monitoring: Sentinel-4 from geostationary orbit and Sentinel-5 from polar orbit. It is envisaged that Sentinel-4 and Sentinel-5 requirements will be met by instruments embarked on the next generation of EUMETSAT meteorological satellites – Meteosat Third Generation and post-EPS (EUMETSAT Polar System), respectively.

In general, the role of the Mission Advisory Group is to provide technical advice to ESA during development and implementation of the mission. For more information about the Mission Advisory Group application procedure please visit the website

Source ESA

ESPI and Eurisy have launched a joint two-year project on how to foster European-African partnership on satellite applications for sustainable development in Africa. Numerous activities will be conducted by the two organisations in 2010 and 2011 with the goal of optimising the exploitation of space applications on the African continent.

Africa is in need for effective instruments supporting its efforts to achieve sustainable development. Satellite applications can be of tremendous benefit for achieving this goal. Europe is already providing assistance to Africa in this field but the efforts – through Eumetsat, ESA, national institutions or via the UN Space Applications Programme – have so far lacked a comprehensive strategy, a coherent coordination and a thorough consultation between the European and the African stakeholders. Especially on an operational level exchanges among user communities have to be encouraged. Calibration between user needs and service provider capabilities has to be improved and service provider requirements have to be met by space infrastructure.

The two-year project “Fostering a European-African Partnership for Sustainable Development in Africa through Satellite Applications” (European-African Partnership) is a joint initiative by ESPI and Eurisy, the European think tank on space policy and the European association facilitating the use of satellite services. Numerous activities will tackle the issues of strategy, coordination, cooperation and consultation in order to create a new impetus for European-African partnership in this field. The process will involve all relevant stakeholders and address in clear and precise ways the various levels: from the policy-makers to the final users. The first phase will investigate the policy aspects, the second phase will feature user consultations and stimulate cooperation among actors on the operational level.

For more information see the project leaflet (download here). The project will be led on ESPI’s side by Resident Fellow Christina Giannopapa.

The following activities are already foreseen:
10 February 2010: European-African Roundtable (at the occasion of the UNCOPUOS Scientific-Technical Subcommittee meeting) at ESPI in Vienna
26 May 2010: Workshop on drafting policy perspectives (strategy and coordination) at ESPI in Vienna
July 2010: Presentation of the policy perspectives to the EU Council Presidency in Brussels
14-15 October 2010: Conference “Development and cooperation in the Mediterranean region using satellite services”, Rabat (Morocco), led by Eurisy
April 2011, Conference, Central Africa led by Eurisy
October 2011, Conference, during the International Astronautical Congress 2011 taking place in Cape Town (South Africa), Eurisy, ESPI, IAF

Download:
20100114 EurisyESPI_for_Africa.pdf

A flood of new geospatial imagery threatens to drown us. Digital airborne sensors are used in increasing numbers, and hundreds of new EO satellites are forecast over the next decade.

This means that image archives of terabytes and petabytes will become the norm, and many organisations will need a different approach to finding data among their holdings and making it ready to use. Spacemetric has a long-established expertise and experience in providing solutions for large and diverse image data holdings that are well suited to meeting these new challenges.

Spacemetric was founded in 1999 by two employees of the Swedish Space Corporation (SSC). The aim of the new company was to commercialise the image production technology they had developed within SSC since the 1980s. Rigorous photogrammetric methods formed the core of the company’s first product, the SIP/Ortho image workstation. Later, in 2003, the European Space Agency leveraged this expertise to provide a web mapping server for satellite browse imagery. Spacemetric’s solution enabled browse images in the ESA catalogue to be seen for the first time in their correct geographical context. The process applied to the browse images a modified form of the physical sensor models that Spacemetric already used so successfully for orthoprocessing of commercial satellite imagery. The browse images were rectified on the fly in large numbers. To guarantee performance, Spacemetric deployed new technologies including application servers to enable parallel processing of multiple browse images. These innovations marked the start of the new, server-oriented business model for the company.


Keystone Console client is an open-source project

In 2004 Spacemetric combined their new server technologies with more of the company’s existing know-how in image production and advanced photogrammetric methods, including the use of ground control to achieve sub-pixel geolocation accuracy in orthoimages. This enabled the automation of orthoimage production by correlation to reference imagery. Customer solutions at the time included DMC International Imaging, where an automated geometrical pre-processing of imagery improved the initial geolocation accuracy of DMC satellite imagery from several kilometres to better than a hundred metres using global Landsat data as a reference. Another customer of note was the National Aerospace Laboratory in the Netherlands, who demonstrated a mobile satellite ground station as part of NATO exercises that received and processed Spot and Eros-A1 imagery. This data was automatically orthoprocessed using Spacemetric’s server that, in the case of the Eros data, used aerial reference imagery to achieve sub-pixel geolocation accuracy.

In late 2005 the first version of the company’s flagship, the Keystone Image Management System, was delivered to DMC International Imaging. This was co-funded by the Swedish National Space Board. The support from DMCii was key to its success and built upon the confidence gained from the simpler geoprocessing server delivered previously by Spacemetric. The Keystone system was a huge leap in capabilities that provided an integrated package incorporating an image archive, catalogue and product generation engine. The Keystone system was the first integrated solution to search and overview very large data holdings and zoom in to full resolution with no need to pre-process the data into an orthoimage map layer.

In 2006 Spacemetric built upon the success of the first Keystone system delivery with a number of contracts that introduced the technology to new customers and applications. A solution for the unit responsible for agricultural subsidy monitoring at the Joint Research Centre (JRC) provided an integrated back-end to the Commission Image Data Portal including cataloguing and orthoprocessing of satellite imagery from multiple commercial satellite sensors. Meanwhile, a system for the Swedish Land Survey (Lantmäteriet) provided a completely new, high-capacity management and production environment for aerial orthoimagery. At this time the Land Survey faced multiple challenges with a new Z/I DMC digital camera generating more data than ever before, the introduction of a new map system in Sweden, and the need for continued support of the old map system. Just having an overview of the available imagery, then locating and making it ready for use, was a significant challenge. The Spacemetric solution addressed all of these issues and was selected over alternatives from better-known suppliers. Subsequent enhancements have included workflow automation and the introduction of multi-threaded parallel processing for very high processing throughput. Meanwhile, applications of the system have been extended to include scanned analogue airphotos and historical maps.

A small but significant feasibility project from 2006 came of age in 2007. This study demonstrated to the defence contractor, SAAB, and the Swedish Air Force that Spacemetric’s Keystone system could manage and process classified imagery from the new SPK39 reconnaissance pod for the Swedish JAS-39 Gripen jet fighter. Orders for several Keystone systems for this application followed. These systems manage rapidly growing archives of imagery and operate in a very time-constrained environment where new and existing data are accessed by an analyst who has less than an hour from the aircraft’s landing to generate completed intelligence reports. Spacemetric’s Keystone solution enables the analyst to quickly search and overview all available data and retrieve only the necessary imagery SPK-39 reconnaissance pod (Courtesy: Gripen International)

Also significant during 2007 was an order to provide the infrastructure for the Swedish national satellite image database Saccess (saccess.lantmateriet.se). This initiative was jointly funded by several Swedish government agencies and managed by the Swedish Land Survey. It offers online access to historical satellite imagery over Sweden stretching back to the 1970s and features a new high-resolution coverage of the entire country every year. Spacemetric provided both the back-end systems to manage the imagery and generate the user products, and the front-end web portal for product ordering. Since its release in summer 2008, over 1,000 users have registered, and several terabytes of image products have been delivered. The Saccess concept is now being extended to Denmark. A final item in 2007 was a Keystone system order from Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd., well known for their small satellites. This concerned the Deimos-1 satellite, a mission within the Disaster Monitoring Constellation. The satellite is owned and operated by Deimos Imaging, a Spanish company created for the purpose of data commercialisation. It carries a 22-metre, wide-swath multispectral sensor.

The Keystone system provides a custom sensor model, mission catalogue, image archive and product processing functions. The Deimos order from SSTL was followed by another in 2008 for the rather more sophisticated Nigeriasat-2 mission. This satellite has a 2.5 metre sensor and a highly agile platform that enables off-nadir acquisitions and the imaging of overlapping areas on the same pass. The Keystone system for this mission has specific capabilities to allow full exploitation of these data. Nigeriasat-2 has an agile platform with a 2.5 metre sensor (Courtesy: Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd)

Spacemetric entered into a significant cooperative venture during 2008 with ITT Visual Information Solutions. Based in Boulder, Colorado, ITT VIS develops and markets the popular ENVI image processing suite. The cooperation with Spacemetric concerns a rigorous orthorectification module to complement the existing ENVI tools. Spacemetric’s Keystone technology provides the back-end “brains” to provide physical sensor models for satellite and airborne sensors and advanced geometrical processing. ITT VIS provides the user interface and worldwide product marketing. Released in early 2009, the Envi Orthorectification Module has been adopted by a number of organisations including the US Marine Topographic Production Center.

In 2009 the Keystone Image Management System became part of several other new initiatives. For the National Aerospace Laboratory in the Netherlands the Keystone system is now the solution adopted for managing airborne video imagery in the development of UAV capabilities for security applications. For the Disaster Monitoring Constellation it already forms the core of the multi-mission ground segment and is playing a central role in the ongoing integration of these missions within the Heterogeneous Missions Accessibility (HMA) infrastructure of the European Space Agency. And for ESA Keystone is the basis for delivering future advanced browse services within the ESA User Services.

Entering the new decade, Spacemetric is well equipped to help both large and small organisations meet their image management challenges. Now available as version 2.1, the Keystone system is a highly scalable enterprise-class solution for any geospatial imagery. Integration with other systems is through open standards and the Keystone API, while an advanced client, the Keystone Console, provides an effective route to exploit the Keystone system’s capabilities. The Keystone Console uses a plugin architecture based upon Eclipse and NASA’s World Wind SDK, and it is an open source project. Several of Spacemetric’s customers are adapting and extending this client to their specific needs. With 2010 marking the start of Spacemetric’s second decade, it is clear that there will continue to be a growing demand for the image management systems that help keep their customers’ heads above water.

Spacemetric AB
Tingsvägen 17
191 61 Sollentuna
Sweden
Tel. +46 8 594 770 80
Fax +46 8 594 770 89
Web www.spacemetric.com
Email info@spacemetric.com
Spacemetric Ltd
The Hub, Suite 3A
Fowler Avenue
Farnborough GU14 7JP
United Kingdom
Tel. +44 207 100 3606

Eomag!20_Spacemetric (Sweden) (Winter 2009-2010).pdf

The GIM GIS Training Centre offers you training to match your needs.

Thematic or hands-on training, basic or advanced, open calendar or bespoke training, at our premises or elsewhere, the choice is yours.

Go for the training that suits you best:

  • Open calendar collective training in small groups for maximum knowledge transfer and optimal interaction between trainer and trainee.
  • Bespoke training starting from your specific training needs, the course content is determined by taking into account the knowledge and the required skills of the trainees. You have maximal participation in the topics to be treated, target audience, planning, language and location for the training.
  • Trainng on the job are you looking for individual coaching on a specific GIS topic or GIS software? Ask for the possibilities of on-site coaching by GIM’s specialists.

Our comprehensive training programmes is the fruit of our product independence and years of GIS experience in various applications.
The GIM trainers are all enthusiastic highly experienced GIS professionals, giving our courses a broad practical basis.
Existing training programmes are constantly updated and new topics are added as the GIS landscape evolves and new technologies and application domains become important.

For land surveyors our whole trainingsprogram is applicable for half of the training hours in the frame work of permant education, because GIM is recognised as training centre for land surveyors by the Federal Council.

Visit our training news page regularly to stay informed about extra training courses or other training related news.

Example Training …

2010/01/19 – Introduction to FME
2010/01/21 – Quantum GIS
2010/01/26 – Introduction to GML
2010/01/28 – Intro to Open GIS Webservices
2010/02/02 – Getting started with GIS
2010/02/04 – GIS for local governments
2010/02/09-11 – MapInfo Basis
2010/02/15-16-17 – eCognition Essentials
2010/02/18-19 – eCognition Rule Set
2010/02/23-25 & 03/02 – ArcGIS Basis
2010/03/04 – MapInfo Adv 1 Data creation
2010/03/09 – MapInfo Adv 2 Data analysis
2010/03/11 – ArcGIS Adv 1 Geodatabase
2010/03/16 – ArcGIS Adv 2 Visualisation
2010/03/18 – ArcGIS Adv 3 Editing
2010/03/23 – ArcGIS Adv 4 Querying
2010/03/25 – ArcGIS Adv 5 Geoprocessing
2010/03/30 – ArcGIS Adv 6 Rasters
2010/03/31 – INSPIRE Directive
2010/04/01 – PostGIS Open Source

more info

From overview to … insight
An image says more than a thousand words.
GIM offers you the key to geographical data. With solutions and bespoke services and the most appropriate software for your specific situation.
GIM specialises in services in geographical information systems, information technology and earth observation and sets itself apart with its software independence.

A side event co-hosted by the Central African Forest Commission (COMIFAC) and GAF AG Munich, Germany was organized on the 11th of December 2009 at the Bella Centre COP15 Copenhagen.

The event was also supported by the German Development Bank (KfW), the German Technical Corporation (GTZ) and Congo Basin Forest Partnership (CBFP). Important to note is the participation of key Environment and Forest Ministers from the COMIFAC sub-region; more specifically the Ministers from the Central African Republic (current President of COMIFAC), the Secretary General of the Economic Community of Central African States (ECCAS), the Ministers from the Republic of Congo, and the Democratic Republic of Congo. Finally the German Minister of Economic Development and Cooperation also supported and participated in the Side Event. Additionally representatives from governments, NGOs and the scientific community were also present.

For more information, please refer to the GSE Forest Monitoring website.

In the Parliament Magazine’s Research Review, FDC reports on the first GMES services available to users.


First GMES services are now available

GMES, the European Earth observation system, will provide policy makers, public authorities and more generally EU citizens with reliable and up-to-date information on environment and security. The GMES services are being developed by projects co-funded by the European Commission. They address land, ocean and atmosphere monitoring as well as emergency response and security.

In an article published in the November issue of the Parliament Magazine’s Research Review, FDC reports on the first GMES services which are now available and indicates how these services can be accessed. More information on GMES can be found on www.gmes.info the web portal operated by FDC in the framework of the SWIFT project, a Coordination and Support Action funded by the European Commission DG Enterprise and Industry.

FDC joins the NEREUS Network!

Convinced of the crucial role that Regions can play in the GMES and GNSS programmes and in the development of their applications, FDC is pleased to join the Network of European Regions Using Space Technologies (NEREUS) as Associate Member.

NEREUS aims to explore the benefits of space technologies for Regions and their citizens and to play an active role in the construction and development of space technology markets. As a strong voice for the regional dimension of European Space Policy, NEREUS wants to increase and enhance the participation of citizens and companies in European Space Policy and Programmes. Ultimately, it strives for an adequate representation of end users’ needs in terms of space applications and services.

Source FDC

EDISOFT welcomes the adoption of the first White Papers of the European Organisation for Security (EOS) on Border Management, Border Surveillance, Civil Protection, Energy Infrastructure Protection and Resilience, Civil Aviation Security, ICT Security, Supply Chain Security and Surface Transport Security.

They are publicly available to the broader public on http://www.eos-eu.com/WHITEPAPERS/tabid/225/Default.aspx.

These White Papers promote a transversal approach that covers all aspects and sectors of security, including cross-cutting aspects. To ensure consistency, the White Papers are incorporated in a global vision for a comprehensive European security approach considerate of local and national security concerns and promoted by EOS Position Paper on Priorities for a Future European Security Framework, which is retrievable from http://www.eos-eu.com/Publications/POSITIONPAPER/tabid/235/Default.aspx.

EDISOFT is an active member of EOS, which, after two years of intense work to build these common positions, is proud of this big achievement that for the first time sees stakeholders of the European Security Market brought together to agree on common messages for the consistent development and harmonization of the market to be proposed to the EU Institutions, the Member States, the Users and Operators and the broader public. The suggested priority actions, and in particular the establishment of sector specific EU Security Programmes, will now be proposed for discussion to the new Commissioners and the European Parliament.

EDISOFT is confident that the recommendations contained in the EOS White Papers and Position Paper will contribute to reducing the fragmentation of the national and European security market, thus promoting the development of a stronger market for innovative security technologies as well as the consistent implementation of security solutions and services.

EOS Members, end of 2009, having contributed to the released White Papers.

Source Edisoft

New Image Analysis Software facilitates fast and accurate geo- information extraction from any kind of remote sensing imagery

Munich, Germany / Parsippany, New Jersey – November 10, 2009 – Definiens, the number one Enterprise Image Intelligence® company, today announced the launch of its latest software offering for earth science professionals, Definiens eCognition® version 8. The new software suite delivers functionality specifically designed for geospatial image analysis while also achieving marked improvements in processing performance.

Leveraging Definiens’ research and development efforts in 3D and 4D image analysis, eCognition 8 introduces new capabilities in multi-dimensional geospatial image analysis. While LiDAR data used to require pre-processing prior to image analysis, with eCognition 8, users are now able to input LiDAR datasets in their native format — a first in the industry. The software can also apply object based image analysis (OBIA) principles to LiDAR data and fuse LiDAR, vector and optical data, allowing users to efficiently manage complex projects.

Another major focus area of eCognition 8 is making the development of semi-automated production applications easier. Within the new version, applications can be wrapped in a powerful and intuitive graphical interface. A range of new manual editing options guide and simplify workflows for production teams, making eCognition 8 more user-friendly and functional than its predecessors.

eCognition 8 also delivers a standardized graphical application called Quickmap. Users can select from alternate start modes depending on their level of experience and the complexity of the image analysis project. As a result, casual eCognition users can quickly create meaningful results using Quickmap, while more seasoned users retain the full functionality of eCognition Developer, which develops rule sets for the automatic analysis of remote sensing data. Quickmap’s code will also be made available so that it can be leveraged in the development of custom applications by the eCognition user community.

“After introducing OBIA to the earth science industry in 2001, we are excited to now introduce eCognition 8, which once again sets new standards for the industry,” said Ralph D. Humberg, Vice President, Earth Sciences at Definiens. “Our latest software incorporates functionality that makes it accessible to new audiences across industries as diverse as insurance, urban planning, defense and forestry while simultaneously allowing experienced users to meet the demands of complex projects more efficiently. We anticipate that eCognition 8 will spur the development of a range of novel applications.”

Beyond improvements to the application building process, eCognition 8 provides advancements in the performance and speed of advanced image analysis. In test cases, eCognition 8 performed up to ten times faster than the previous version, as a result of more effective utilization of processing resources.

Definiens launched the eCognition 8 software suite at the IMAX Theatre in Munich on November 2, 2009 as part of its four-day eCognition User Summit. For more information, visit: http://earth.definiens.com/ecognition-user-summit-munich-2009-information.

Definiens in Earth Sciences

Definiens enables organizations involved in Earth Sciences to quickly extract accurate geo-information from any kind of remote sensing data. The company assists data providers, value adders, scientists and end users in integrating earth observation and remote sensing data to generate accurate GIS-ready information. Definiens’ intelligent feature extraction capabilities accelerate mapping, change detection and object recognition–delivering standardized and reproducible image analysis results. Further information is available at http://earth.definiens.com.

About Definiens

Definiens is the number one Enterprise Image Intelligence company for analyzing and interpreting images on every scale, from microscopic cell structures to satellite images. The Definiens Cognition Network Technology®, developed by Nobel laureate Prof. Gerd Binnig and his team, is an advanced and robust context-based technology designed to fulfill the image analysis requirements of the Medical, Life and Earth Sciences markets. The technology is modeled on the powerful human cognitive perception processes to extract intelligence from images. Definiens provides organizations with faster image analysis results, allowing deeper insights enabling better business decisions. The company is headquartered in Munich, Germany and has offices throughout the United States. Further information is available at www.definiens.com.

Definiens, Definiens Cognition Network Technology, Definiens eCognition, eCognition, Enterprise Image Intelligence and Understanding Images are trademarks or registered trademarks of Definiens.

Press Contacts

Definiens
Eva Tietz
Manager Corporate Communications
etietz@definiens.com Ricochet Public Relations
Garry Clark
Phone: +1 212.679.3300 ×114
gclark@ricochetpr.com