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Because the flight planning has now been fully removed to be a 
part of the bidder’s job and subsequently a job for the chosen 
contractor, KMS instead maintain and deliver a detailed 
specification on how planning and project-definitions must be 
done. 
Before the contractor is allowed to initiate the data-capture, the 
production-solutions must be approved by KMS. 
4.2 Tender evaluation 
The KMS photo campaign tender, is an EU-tender assigned to 
certain specific rules regarding publication, evaluation and so 
forth. These rules are the same though, for both analogue and 
digital image production. 
One topic that has shown to have big influence on the process 
of tender-evaluation, is the number of bets that is received on a 
tender. The number of bets received on a digital photo 
campaign is, among other topics, also a question on how many 
companies that actually do offer a digital solution. Especially in 
the first years this was evident. 
If a tender is open for digital production only, it will probably 
mean that prices will be high, reflecting that there is only little 
competition. On the other hand, if a tender is open to both 
analogue and digital production, then one has to seriously 
consider the different weights on the evaluation criteria, on both 
economy and on quality. 
If the economy is weighted to high, it is certain that the 
analogue bidder’s are favoured, by not having new investments 
to pay, and one might be “stocked” on old technology. But if 
quality is weighted to high, it is likely that the price-jump from 
an earlier analogue production will be high, even though there 
might be analogue and cheaper bets in the tender as well. 
By tuning the evaluation criteria’s in the tender, year by year, 
one might keep influence on operating the photo campaign, in a 
world of changing accessibility to old and new technical 
production systems. 
Another topic is that the evaluation of the tender has shown to 
be more complicated to handle than before. This is basically 
because a digital solution differs more compared to both 
analogue and also to other digital solutions, than it did before. 
When comparing each solution on technology, methodology 
and logistics and quality assessments. 
4.3 Data capture 
The digital data capture, as for the analogue, is produced by the 
contractor, including only informative communication to the 
customer on quality and progress. 
The digital data capture is facilitated by a possibility to do “on 
the fly” verification of what is logged on the camera-computer. 
Normally this is done solely by the contractor. 
Because of the digital camera-technique and optics, it has 
shown that even images captured in less good conditions as 
“high cloud cover” or “low sun angle”, can actually be used for 
mapping, orthoimages etc. with good results. This is also 
because image quality can be optimized in the image processing. 
This means that data capturing time can be extended to include 
both some “cloudy days” and also by more production hours on 
both ends of a photo day. On the other hand, because image 
extend, in the digital cameras are smaller than in the analogue 
cameras, a higher number of flight lines are needed to cover the 
same area. 
Camera-failures are more “unexpected” and “uncertain” in the 
new digital cameras, when it comes to technique and 
architecture, as they are still not yet as fully proven and 
understood. KMS has not yet conclusions on how often and 
how much this affect the data capture campaign. 
4.4 Data logistics 
Data logistic is in both analogue and digital data collection in 
responsibility of the contractor, with only informative 
communication with the customer on quality and progress. 
The time delay from “when images are taken” until the 
customer has a “read-out image for QA”, is shortened 
dramatically. This means that the customer now “has a chance 
to be”, more involved in the early process of QA-dialog with 
the contractor. This might request more work and also some 
new capabilities by the costumer. But it is also a tool for 
optimizing the data and the forthcoming use of the data. 
A matter to be aware of on logistics, is the maximum possible 
data amount to be captured in one day. As for the analogue 
production one might run out of film, in the digital production 
one must be aware of how much disc space are available for 
both capturing images for a whole day, and also how much disc 
space and time (speed) are available for emptying the camera- 
data to a transport media. It is important that this does not delay 
the photo campaign. Especially if data has to be captured within 
a limited time-period. 
4.5 Data processing 
Data processing is essential on merging the digital cameras 
different single CCD’s into one geometrically correct image. 
Software to do this is developed by the camera-producer and is 
derived to handle one specific camera type. 
While processing the merged image from the different CCDs, 
the contractor also set up the radiometric presentation of the 
image. This can include direct processing, pan sharpening and 
also 12 bit to 8 bit image conversion. The different camera- 
types uses different techniques and different user interfaces for 
these processes. And therefore reflect an “camera-specific 
methodology”. Actually one has to rely completely on the 
producers skills and experiences with the software. 
Many important aspect of the image presentation are included 
in the image-processing. And the processing is often managed 
or presented, as a “black box”. Therefore the conclusion in 
KMS is, that this is a very important topic, which KMS will 
focus on in the future. 
Until now experiences are that, in general it is not very easy to 
interact with the producers, during this process. 
4.6 Data volume 
By analogue aerial image campaigns, the images were 
traditionally exposed on either colour or black/white film. For