Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
Figure 12.2
Scale and complexity of landscape: a valley floor scene represented in a photograph
(left) and a computer-generated visualization from a radar terrain model (right)
the task if attempting full photorealism. Also, we should look beyond the purely visual
comparison of virtual and real landscape scenes and consider the role of spatial context,
a-priori
knowledge and what was termed above the 'essence' of a landscape scene. It is in this
general area of interest that several exploratory collaborations have taken place between the
authors over a number of years which explore issues of representation and understanding
as encountered in the fields of geographic information science (GIScience) and fine art, in
particular figurative painting.
12.4 Broadening the context
The question of 'what we should be representing' is an important issue that has faced
geographical information scientists for many years (Fonseca
et al
., 2000; Hart, 2004) and
certainly too broad in scope to do justice to in this work. It is, however, the intention to iden-
tify certain interdisciplinary approaches to landscape representation which may be relevant
in this broader context and which may contribute to the GIScience research agenda more
specifically. As geographic information becomes used more in a 'first person' context on mo-
bile devices then the immediate and direct relationship between virtual representation and
the real world around the user becomes ever more important. The design of more egocentric
representations (Meng, 2005) required to work on small screens in a range of outdoor con-
texts may need to address the issues of spatial context,
a-priori
knowledge and the 'essence'
of the user's immediate surroundings as introduced earlier. A good example of develop-
ments in this field is the mobile phone application Viewranger developed by Augmentra
Ltd (2007), which offers recreational walkers a dynamically updated and annotated skyline
given by the user's orientation from the recent GPS track. Such representations, in this
case inspired by pictorial guides to the Cumbria fells (Wainwright, 1964), seek to identify a
suitable frame of reference for a given type of user in a given situation. What will continue
to be a huge challenge is to explore landscape representations which attempt to serve many
different types of users with different backgrounds, levels of expertise and motives.
The authors have developed an ongoing dialogue around themes of representation
through collaboration on a number of projects driven by a desire to explore regimes of
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