Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
Visualization with
High-resolution Aerial
Photography in
Planning-related
Property Research
Scott Orford
School of City and Regional Planning, Cardiff University
7.1 Introduction
The visualization of the built environment in geography, planning and architecture has
generally been concerned with visualizing built form. Traditionally this has been related
to CAD/CAM (computer aided design/computer aided manufacturing) systems and GIS,
but recently there has been significant growth in the use of scientific visualization such as
multimedia, animation, virtual reality and web-based technologies (Orford, 2005). However,
an older technique for visualizing the built environment has been through photography and,
in particular, aerial photography. Although well established, their use has been marginalized
in an era of computer graphics and computer simulations, despite the fact that they can offer
important insights into a city's function and form, particularly over time. This is changing
with the advent of high-resolution aerial photographs of many of the world's key urban
areas becoming easier to access from both commercial and non-commercial organizations.
Aerial photographs are among the most important, widely available and commonly used
kinds of remotely sensed images. Remote sensing is the identification or survey of objects
from a distance using instruments aboard aircraft and spacecraft to collect information.
The photographic camera remains the oldest and most common of such devices. One of the
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