Minutes of Meeting between EuroSDR and ISPRS
Venue: Beijing International Convention Centre, Beijing, China
Date: 10th July 2008
Time: 3pm
Attending:
Orhan Altan, President ISPRS
Ian Dowman, First Vice-President ISPRS
Ammatzia Peled, Second Vice-President ISPRS
Naser El-Sheimy President ISPRS Commission I
Wenzhong Shi, President ISPRS Commission II
Nicholas Paparoditis, President ISPRS Commission III
Marguerite Madden, President ISPRS Commission IV
Jon Mills, President ISPRS Commission V
Martien Molenaar, President ISPRS Commission VI
Wolfgang Wagner, President ISPRS Commission VII
Haruhisa Shimoda, President ISPRS Commission VIII
Secretary of ISPRS Commission VIII
Antonio Arozarena, President EuroSDR
Christian Heipke, Vice-President EuroSDR
Kevin Mooney, Secretary-General EuroSDR
Oonagh Birchall, Assistant to Secretary-General EuroSDR
Andre Streilein-Hurni, Chairman EuroSDR Commission III
Wolfgang Kresse, Chairman EuroSDR Intercommission Working Group on Standards
Peter Woodsford, Chairman EuroSDR Taskforce "Think Tank"
Lena Halounova, EARSeL
Mark Cygan, International Map Trade Association
Apologies:
Michael Cramer, Chairman of EuroSDR Commission 1, Juha Hyyppa, Chairman EuroSDR Commission 2, Ulf Sandgren, Chairman of EuroSDR Commission 4, Mike Jackson, Chairman of EuroSDR Commission 5
Minutes
Ian Dowman opened the meeting by welcoming everyone and outlining the reason and objective for this meeting. These were to identify common areas of interest between EuroSDR and ISPRS and to explore ways to collaborate more effectively through more formal collaboration and co-operation.
All present introduced themselves briefly. Kevin Mooney gave a description of EuroSDR and its activities.
EuroSDR
Commission 1: Sensors, Primary Data Acquisition and Geo-referencing
In the absence of Michael Cramer, Christian Heipke gave a brief description of the activities of Commission 1.
Research activities under this Commission are:
- European Digital Airborne Camera Certification - EuroDAC2
- Digital Camera Calibration
- Unconventional Platforms for Remote Sensing
- Radiometric Aspects of Digital Photogrammetric Images
- Performance of Medium Format Cameras
- GeoSensor Networks Workshop (jointly with ISPRS)
- EuroCOW - Calibration and Orientation Workshops (jointly with ISPRS)
Commission 2: Image Analysis and Information Extraction
In the absence of Juha Hyyppa, Christian Heipke also gave a brief description of the activities of Commission 2.
Research activities under this Commission are:
- Tree Extraction
- Mobile Mapping - Road Environment Mapping using Vehicle-based Laser Scanning
- Towards Integration of Laser Scanning and Photogrammetry
- Detection of unregistered buildings for updating 2D databases
- Radiometric Calibration of ALS Intensity
Commission 3: Production Systems and Processes
André Streilein gave a brief description of the activities of Commission 3.
Research activities under this Commission are:
- Virtual Globes
- CityGML
- Potential of airborne digital cameras for vegetation detection (proposed)
Commission 4: Data Specifications
Peter Woodsford gave a brief overview of the activities of both Commission 4 and 5.
Research activities under Commission 4 are:
- Generalisation (in co-operation with ICA)
- Production Partnership Management
- Multiple Information Representation and Consistent Logical Environment - Enabling multiple representation and consistency in spatial information
- Land/Marine Information Integration Workshop (in co-operation with IHO)
Commission 5: Network Services
Research activities under this Commission are:
- A Persistent Testbed for Geo Web Services for Research and Education (together with OGC and AGILE)
- Think Tank "Technology Roadmap"
EuroSDR Education Service - "EduServ"
Kevin Mooney described the annual series of distance e-learning courses aimed at transferring the results of research activities to the production domain. Four courses are offered each year, followed on average by 30 international participants.
It was noted that there is currently no accreditation for EduServ courses. A limited number of scholarships are offered each year.
EuroSDR Publications
The official EuroSDR publications series has now reached 54 publications. These are either the reports of research projects or proceedings of research workshops. Published and distributed by Gopher NL in the Netherlands, EuroSDR publications are financed by kind sponsorship of BKG Frankfurt. All publications are available for free download from the EuroSDR website (http://www.eurosdr.net/).
Intercommission Working Group on Standards.
Wolfgang Kresse gave description of the activities of the Intercommission Working Group on Standards and identified considerable potential overlap with ISPRS activities in this area.
ISPRS
Commission 1: Image Data Acquisition: Sensors and Platforms.
Naser El-Sheimy sees collaboration with EuroSDR Commission 1, in particular Digital Camera Certification and Geo Sensor Networks. He then gave a list of ISPRS Commission 1 activities and would welcome input from Michael Cramer and Christian Heipke on working group activities.
The issue of EuroSDR project data availability was raised and its potential for further ISPRS or EuroSDR activities. Christain Heipke noted that EuroSDR data is usually available to all when a project is completed. It was further mentioned that ISPRS Commission III also has data sets available.
Commission II: Theory and Concepts of Spatio-Temporal Data Handling and Information
Wenzhong Shi listed the activities of this Commission and sees collaboration with EuroSDR Commission 4 and also maybe Commission 5, maybe through joint projects and jointly organised activities. The combination of research and practice by EuroSDR was noted.
Commission II will focus on fundamental issues of GIS and GIS as a science.
The ISPRS Commission II Inter-congress Symposium will be held in Hong Kong in 2010.
Peter Woodsford pointed out the last joint ISPRS/EuroSDR workshop on Ontologies/Schema Translation was run four years ago and noted the need for a further workshop at this stage.
Commission III: Photogrammetric Computer Vision and Image Analysis
Nicholas Paparoditis listed the working groups of this Commission. He identifies many potential areas of overlap and collaboration with EuroSDR, and in particular Mobile Mapping and CityGML. This commission could also contribute to EuroCOW.
Commission IV: Geodatabases and Digital Mapping
Marguerite Madden gave a brief description of this Commission. There is a close working relationship with ISPRS Commission 2. There could be collaboration with EuroSDR Commissions 4 and 5.
ISPRS Commission 4 includes cyber spatial data infrastructure. Commission 4 would like to contribute to international initiatives on updating core databases, a global DEM, semantic aspects, ontology and interoperability of databases.
Commission V: Close Range Sensing: Analysis and Application
Jon Mills gave a brief description of this Commission which will work closely with ISPRS Commissions I and III.
A 3D Modelling Group will be active in this Commission.
The Inter-Congress Symposium will be held in United Kingdom in 2010.
He sees collaboration with EuroSDR activities on Unconventional Platforms and Mobile Mapping. Application areas for this Commission will include cultural heritage and terrestrial laser scanning will be of particular interest.
Commission VI: Education and Outreach
Martien Molenaar stated that the main emphasis of this Commission will be on tools and settings for cross border education and proposed the following working groups:
Working Group 1 - eDelivery of courses
Working Group 2 - Web Based Education
Working Group 3 - Frameworks for joint educational programmes (legal and accreditation aspects)
Working Group 4 - Structure of joint education programmes
This Commission is also the homebase for the ISPRS student consortium.
EuroSDR's EduServ series was identified as an area for potential fruitful collaboration, particularly if it could be made available for programme updates in developing countries. The synergy between the ISPRS Technology Transfer Caravan and EuroSDR's Education Service should be explored.
Commission VII: Thematic Processing, Modelling and Analysis of Remotely Sensed Data
Wolfgang Wagner briefly described this Commission.
He identified benchmarking tests of the type carried out by EuroSDR, as an activity to be pursued in this four year period.
Particular interest was noted in radiometric calibration and in the hyperspectral field where there is a lack of calibration and standardisation efforts.
He sees possible collaboration with EuroSDR Commission 2.
Commission VIII: Remote Sensing Applications and Policies
Haruhisa Shimoda described his plans for this Commission which included proposed working groups as follows: Disaster and Health, Climate, Water, Energy, Ecosystems/Biodiversity, Land, Ocean and Cryosphere.
It was noted that this Commission would work closely with GEOSS and the Land/Marine Information Integration activity of EuroSDR was identified as an area of interest.
Discussion
EuroSDR can identify projects important to the National Mapping Agencies and collaborate with ISPRS.
Technology transfer from research to production is one of the main aims of EuroSDR.
ISPRS can help in finding potential international project leaders and also in identifying potential projects.
It was agreed that there should be formal communication between the two organisations including exchange of newsletters and points of contact.
Each organisation should consider including ISPRS/EuroSDR collaboration as an agenda item at its appropriate meetings.
It was noted that there could a clash of dates of meetings between EuroSDR and ISPRS so it was suggested that calendars should be circulated to avoid this issue.
The possibility of an eastern European forum targeting national mapping agencies was discussed.
The possibility of a meeting of all regional ISPRS members on the occasion of the ISPRS centenary celebrations was considered.