Real-time Terrain Mapping

Abstract. We present an interactive, real-time mapping system for digital elevation maps (DEMs), which allows Earth scientists to map and therefore understand the deformation of the continental crust at length scales of 10 m to 1000 km. Our system visualizes the surface of the Earth as a 3D surface generated from a DEM, with a color texture generated from a registered multispectral image and vector-based mapping elements draped over it. We use a quadtree-based multiresolution method to be able to render high-resolution terrain mapping data sets of large spatial regions in real time. The main strength of our system is the combination of interactive rendering and interactive mapping directly onto the 3D surface, with the ability to navigate the terrain and to change viewpoints arbitrarily during mapping. User studies and comparisons with commercially available mapping software show that our system improves mapping accuracy and efficiency, and also enables qualitatively different observat...

• Type: Conference
• Year: 2010
• Where: DAGSTUHL
• Authors: Tony Bernardin, Eric Cowgil, Ryan D. Gold, Bernd Hamann, Oliver Kreylos
• Keywords: DAGSTUHL 2007, DAGSTUHL 2010, Real-time Mapping, Software Engineering, Terrain Mapping Data, Vector-based Mapping Elements