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3.4 Stereo Visualization and Editing
The most advanced PhoTopoL configuration gives
stereo plotting capabilities. In this configuration the
system uses two monitors. The primary one is for Pho-
TopoL control screen (with menus, dialogs and draw-
ing canvases) and the secondary one is used for stere-
oplotting. This configuration requires to upgrade per-
sonal computer with special stereovision equipment
(in our case with StereoGraphics Crystal Eyes and
video adapter Number Nine Imagine 128), which is
supplied with the PhoTopoL Stereo system.
PhoTopoL Stereo enable users to view and edit in
stereo. The system offer possibility to register X, Y,
Z coordinates of new points using floating or fixed
cursor as well as update position of points provided
by other input techniques, which are supplied within
TopoL GIS system. The data are captured and ma-
nipulated directly into GIS system which offers imme-
diate attribute collection as well as full scale of GIS
functionality (such as edit tools, analyses and other
visualization methods).
3.5 TopoL GIS system
PhoTopoL not only supports links to various GIS sys-
tems, but it also includes special version of TopoL
GIS system. TopoL is a general Land /Geographic In-
formation System software which allows the creation,
maintenance, analysis and visualization of geograph-
ical data. This original Czech product integrates the
traditional vector-based GIS system with a powerful
tool for image processing and remote-sensing. It is es-
pecially strong in its ability to create composite black-
and-white or colour raster-and-vector output — for ex-
ample, property boundary outlines superimposed on
an aerial photograph.
TopoL GIS is capable of handling both vector and
raster data equally well from a display, query and func-
tional perspective. Additional non-spatial information
can be attached to this graphical data and stored in lo-
cal or external databases. Extensive care was focused
on topology and support for topographic structures of
vector data. The system provides wide scale of vector
and raster data manipulation and analyses methods,
which includes vector data overlays, database analy-
ses as well as image processing and multispectral data
classification.
4 PhoTopoL applications
We would like to present some examples of PhoTopoL
use in real practice. In this section we describe in short
various applications of the system (forestry, aerial
photoplans, regional management). We also present
in detail one middle-scale project of orthophoto map
creation performed within our data capture depart-
ment.
303
4.1 Application overview
We were able to sell 15 installations of the system
within three months after its introduction to soft-
ware market. The system is currently used in forestry
(Lesprojekt — Forest Management Institute) and re-
gional management (District council Klatovy) as well
as in firms specialized to photogrammetric processing
(e.g. NADIR). The system is also prepared for sale into
other countries, because it is available in English, Ger-
man, and Italian version. Our official distributors in
Slovakia, Germany, Italy, Switzerland, Russia, Latvia
and Estonia are able to provide full support for our
customers.
TopoL GIS system is currently considered to be the
standard GIS system for forestry in the Czech Re-
public and it is also used for forest management in
Germany and Italy. One of our biggest customers
- Forest Management Institute - is currently using
PhoTopoL especially for orthorectification of aerial
photographs. These photographs are used as one of
sources for the creation of forest management plans in
the whole Czech Republic. Specialists in Forest Man-
agement Institute are also quite satisfied with stereo
plotting capabilities of PhoTopoL.
Our subsidiary Help Forest have used PhoTopoL in
several forest management projects for DEM genera-
tion and orthorectification. Land management office
of District council Klatovy started to use PhoTopoL
for the creation of orthophoto maps. These maps will
be used directly as one source for decision-making in
regional management as well as for quick evaluation
of maps which are currently utilized in land modifi-
cation projects. NADIR photogrammetric company
have started with the use of PhoTopoL for large-scale
projects, especially in the preparation of aerial photo-
plans.
4.2 Nymburk project
Nymburk is one district of the Czech Republic. It has
about 880 square kilometers of land size. The project
was performed for District council Nymburk. The goal
of the whole project was to create orthophoto maps of
the whole district in the scale 1 : 10,000. These maps
will be used for map evaluation and updating as well
as next source of data for decision-making.
66 colour aerial photographs in the approximate scale
1: 25,000 was used as the main source for the
project. These photographs were scanned into true
colour TIFF raster files with 600 DPI resolution. Ap-
proximate size of one image was about 90 MB. After
scanning images were converted into internal format
of PhoTopoL and stored on optical disks.
The PhoTopoL internal images can be stored in tiled
format which enables very efficient access to the disk
International Archives of Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing. Vol. XXXI, Part B2. Vienna 1996
