PGE 317: Map Reading, Remote Sensing and GIS

Part-B: Geographic Information System (GIS)

Lecture 3-4: Data Model & Geospatial Data

 Data Model
• A set of guidelines to convert the real world (called
entity) to the digitally and logically represented spatial
objects consisting of the attributes and geometry.

• Types of geometric data model

– Vector Model
- Model uses discrete points, lines and/or areas
corresponding to discrete objects with name or code
number of attributes

– Raster Model
- Model uses regularly spaced grid cells in specific
sequence. An element of grid cell is called a pixel (picture
cell)
 Vector and Raster Model

Vector model 256 color more colors

Raster model
Example of vector based model
Example of raster
representation
 1. Geometry and Topology of
Vector Data
• Geometry
– Spatial objects are classified into
• point object such as meteorological station,
• line object such as highway and
• area object such as agricultural land,
– which are represented geometrically by point, line and
area respectively

• Topology
– refers to the relationships or connectivity between
spatial objects
Geometry and Topology of Vector
Data
• Node
– an intersect of more
than two lines or
strings, or start and
end point of string
with node number

• Chain
– a line or a string with
chain number, start
and end node
number, left and right
neighbored polygons

• Polygon
– an area with polygon
number, series of
chains that form the
area in clockwise
order (minus sign is
assigned in case of
anti-clockwise order).
 Topological Data Structure
In order to analyze a network consisting of nodes and chains, the
following topology should be built.

– Chain : Chain ID, Start Node ID, End Node ID, Attributes.

– Node: Node ID, (x, y), adjacent chain IDs (positive for to
node, negative for from node).

For relationship between polygons the following additional topology

need to be built

– Chain geometry : Chain ID, Start Coordinates, Point

Coordinates, End Coordinates.

– Chain topology : Chain ID, Start Node ID, End Node ID,
Left Polygon ID, Right Polygon ID, (Attributes).

– Polygon topology : Polygon ID, Series of Chain ID, in

clockwise order (Attributes).
Topological Relationships
between Spatial Objects
2. Geometry and Topology of
Raster Data
The geometry of raster data is given by point, line and
area objects

• Point objects
A point is given by point ID, coordinates (i, j) and the
attributes

• Line object
A line is given by line ID, series of coordinates
forming the line, and the attributes

• Area objects
An area segment is given by area ID, a group of
coordinates forming the area and the attributes.
Topological Features of Raster
Data
One of the weak points in raster model is the difficulty in
network and spatial analysis as compared with vector
model.

• Flow directions
– A line with directions can be represented by four
directions called as the Rook's move in the chess
game or eight directions called as the Queen’s move
Topological Features of Raster
Data

• Topological Features of Raster Data

– Boundary is defined as 2 x 2 pixel window that has
two different classes
• Node
– A node in polygon model can be defined as a 2 x 2
window that has more than three different classes
Example of
Raster boundary
 Thematic Data Modeling
• The real world entities are so complex that they
should be classified into object classes with some
similarity through thematic data modeling in a spatial
database.

• The objects in a spatial database are defined as

representations of real world entities with associated
attributes.

• Geospatial data have three major components:

position, attributes and time

• Attributes are often termed "thematic data" or "non-

spatial data", that are linked with spatial data or
geometric data.
 Attributes
– An attribute has a defined characteristic of
entity in the real world.

– Attribute can be categorized as normal,

ordinal, numerical, conditional and other
characteristics.

– Attribute values are often listed in attribute

tables which will establish relationships
between the attributes and spatial data
such as point, line and area objects, and
also among the attributes
 Layers
• Spatial objects in
digital representation
can be grouped into
layers.

• For example, a map

can be divided into a
set of map layers
consisting of
contours, boundaries,
roads, rivers, houses,
forests etc.
Map Layers
 Overlay of Spatial data layers
• Two different object layers can be overlaid
which can result another layers
Data Structure for Continuous
Surface Model
In GIS, continuous surface such as terrain surface, meteorological
observation (rain fall, temperature, pressure etc.) population
density and so on should be modeled

• Grid at regular intervals

– Bi-linear surface with four points or bi-cubic surface with
sixteen points is commonly used
• Random points
– Triangulated irregular network (TIN) is commonly used.
Interpolation by wieghted polynomails is also used.
• Contour lines
– Interpolation based on proportional distance between
adjacent contours is used. TIN is also used.
• Profile
– Profiles are observed perpendicular to an alignment or a
curve such as high ways. In case the alignment is a straight
line, grid points will be interpolated. In case the alignment is
a curve, TIN will be generated.
Different Types of DEM
Example of Contour map & 3D
view
Required Data Sources for GIS
Required Data Sources for GIS
As data acquisition or data input of geospatial data in digital format is most
expensive and procedures are time consuming in GIS, the data sources for data
acquisitions should be carefully selected for specific purposes.

• Analog maps
Topographic maps with contours and other terrain features and thematic maps
with respect to defined object classes are digitized by digitizers manually or by
scanners semi-automatically.

• Aerial photographs
Analytical or digital photogrammetry is rather expensive but the best method for
updating

• Satellite image
Satellite images or data are available for land use classification, digital elevation
model (DEM), updating highway network etc.

• Ground survey with GPS

Total station together with GPS (Global Positioning System) will modernize the
ground survey.

• Reports and publications

Social economic data are usually listed in the reports of statistics and census
with respect to administration units.
Major Data Sources for GIS
Data Acquisition Methods
 Digitizers for Vector Data Input
• Tablet digitizers with a free cursor
connected with a personal computer are
the most common device for digitizing
spatial features with the planimetric
coordinates from analog maps.
 Major problems of map
digitization
• The map will stretch
or shrink day by day
which makes the
newly digitized points
slightly off from the
previous points.
• The map itself has
errors.
• Discrepancies across
neighboring map
sheets will produce
disconnectivity.
Selecting a digitizing technique
Scanners for Raster Data Input
• Scanner are used to convert from analog maps or photographs
to digital image data in raster format.
• Mechanical Scanner
It is called drum scanner since a map or an image placed on a
drum is digitized mechanically with rotation of the drum and shift
of the sensor. It is accurate but slow.
• Video Camera
Video camera with CRT (cathode ray tube) is often used to
digitize a small part of map of firm. This is not very accurate but
cheap.
• CCD Camera
Area CCD camera (called digital still camera) instead of video
camera will be also convenient to acquire digital image data. It is
more stable and accurate than video camera.
• CCD Scanner
Flat bed type or roll feed type scanner with linear CCD (charge
coupled device) is now commonly used to digitize analog maps
in raster format, either in mono-tone or color mode. It is accurate
but expensive.
Major Types of Scanner
Performance of major scanners
I/O of scanning process

(a) original document

in black (with scanner
resolution in green)

(b) scanned document in

gray scale pixel (0=black,
255= white)
 Digital Mapping by Aerial
Photogrammetry
• Analytical Photogrammetry
Though computer systems are used for aerial
triangulation, measuring map data, editing and output
with pen plotter, a stereo pair of analog films are set up
in a stereo plotter and the operator will manually read
terrain features through stereo photogrammetric plotter
called analytical plotter.

• Digital Photogrammetry
In digital photogrammetry, aerial films are converted into
digital image data with high resolution (5-25mm). Digital
elevation model (DEM) is automatically generated with
stereo matching using digital photogrammetric
workstation.
 Procedures
of
Aerial
Phtogrammetry
 Remote Sensing with Satellite
Imagery
• Satellite remote sensing is a modern technology to
obtain digital image data of the terrain surface in the
electro-magnetic region of visible, infrared and
microwave.

• Multi-spectral bands including visible, near-infrared

and/or thermal infrared are most commonly used for
production of land use map, soil map, geological map,
agricultureal map, forest map etc. at the scale of
1:50,000 ~ 250,000.

• A lot of earth observation satellites for example landsat,

SPOT, ERS-1, JERS-1, IRS, Radarsat etc. are available.
Earth Observation Satellites
High Resolution Satellites
 Advanced Technologies for
Primary Data Acquisition
Following advanced technologies will be useful for future GIS.

• Electronic Plane Surveying System

An integrated system of total station with automated tracking function,
kinematics global positioning system (GPS) and a pen computer will replace
the conventional plane surveying.

• Mobile Mapping System

Different sensors such as GPS, INS (inertia navigation system), more than
two digital cameras, voice recorder etc. are fixed on a vehicle in order to map
objects in close range.

• Laser Scanner
Airborne laser scanner together with GPS and INS will measure directly the
terrain releif or DEM with the height accuracy of 10 cm up to the altitude of
1,000 m.

• SAR Interferometer
SAR (synthetic apperture radar) inter-ferometry is a new technology to
produce DEM automatically by special interferometric processing of a pair of
SAR images.
Advanced Technologies
Advanced Technologies (contd..)
 Rasterization
• Conversion between raster and vector data is very
useful in practical applications of GIS.

• Rasterization refers to conversion from vector to

raster data.

• Raster format is more convennient to produce color

coded polygon maps such as color coded land use
map, while map digitizing in vector format is more
easier to trace only the boundary.

• Rasterization is also useful to integrate GIS with

remote sensing becaues remote sensing images are
in raster format.
Conversion Vector to Raster
• trapezoid area can be applied to convert vectorized
polygon to rasterized polygon with grid cells
 Vectorization
• Vectorization refers to conversion from
raster to vector data, which is often called
raster vector conversion.
Thank you