Machine Vision Algorithms on Cadaster Plans

Cadaster plans are cornerstones for reconstructing dense representations of the history of the city. They provide information about the city urban shape, enabling to reconstruct footprints of most important urban components as well as information about the urban population and city functions. However, as some of these handwritten documents are more than 200 years old, the establishment of processing pipeline for interpreting them remains extremely challenging. We present the first implementation of a fully automated process capable of segmenting and interpreting Napoleonic Cadaster Maps of the Veneto Region dating from the beginning of the 19th century. Our system extracts the geometry of each of the drawn parcels, classifies, reads and interprets the handwritten labels

Machine Vision algorithms on cadaster plans

Cadaster plans are cornerstones for reconstructing dense representations of the history of the city. However, as some of these handwritten documents are more than 200 years old, the establishment of processing pipeline for interpreting them remains extremely challenging. The talk will present the implementation of an automated process capable of segmenting and interpreting Napoleonic Cadaster Maps of the Veneto Region dating from the beginning of the 19th century. Using a deep learning approach, the system extracts the geometry of each of the drawn parcels, reads and interprets the handwritten labels. This efficient and automated process opens new perspectives to reconstitute the past

Landscape Pattern Detection in Archaeological Remote Sensing

Automated detection of landscape patterns on Remote Sensing imagery has seen virtually no development or application in the archaeological domain, notwithstanding the fact that large portion of cultural landscapes worldwide are characterised by land engineering applications. The current extraordinary availability of remotely sensed data makes it now urgent to envision and develop automatic methods that can simplify the inspection of RS data and the extraction of relevant information from them, as the quantity of data is no longer manageable by traditional ‘human’ visual interpretation. This paper expands on the development of automatic methods for the detection of target landscape features –intended as field system patterns– in very high spatial resolution images, within the framework of VEiL, a landscape archaeology project based in Italy and focused on the engineered landscape of the Roman city of Aquileia. The targets of interest consist of a variety of similarly oriented objects (such as roads, drainage channels etc.) that concur to demark the current landscape organisation, which reflects the one imposed by Romans from the 2nd cent. BC onward. The proposed workflow exploits the textural and shape properties of real-world elements forming the field patterns using multiscale analysis of dominant oriented response filters. Experiments using remote sensing imagery show that the proposed approach provides accurate localisation of target linear objects and alignments signalled by a wide range of physical entities with very different characteristics

Introducing an Automated Pipeline for a Browser-based, City-scale Mobile 4D VR Application Based on Historical Images

The process for automatically creating 3D city models from contemporary photographs and visualizing them on mobile devices is now well established, but historical 4D city models are more challenging. The fourth dimension here is time. This contribution describes an automated VR pipeline based on historical photographs and resulting in an interactive browser-based device-rendered 4D visualization and information system for mobile devices. Since the pipeline shown is currently still under development, initial results for stages of the process will be shown and assessed for feasibility

전근대 토지대장과 지적도의 대화형 분석을 위한 시각화 설계

학위논문 (박사)-- 서울대학교 대학원 : 전기·컴퓨터공학부, 2016. 2. 서진욱.We propose an interactive visualization design tool, called JigsawMap, for analyzing and mapping historical textual cadasters. A cadaster is an official register that records land properties (e.g., location, ownership, value and size) for land valuation and taxation. Such mapping of old and new cadasters can help historians understand the social and economic background of changes in land uses or ownership. JigsawMap can effectively connect the past land survey results to modern cadastral maps. In order to accomplish the connection process, three steps are performed: (1) segmentation of cadastral map, (2) visualization of textual cadastre, (3) and mapping interaction. We conducted usability studies and long term case studies to evaluate JigsawMap, and received positive responses. We summarize the evaluation results and present design guidelines for participatory design projects with historians. Followed by our study on JigsawMap, we further investigated on each components of our tool for more scalable map connection. First, we designed a hybrid algorithm to semi-automatically segment land pieces on cadastral map. The original JigsawMap provides interface for user to segment land pieces and the experiment result shows that segmentation algorithm accurately extracts the regions. Next, we reconsidered the visual encoding and simplified it to make textual cadastre more scalable. Since the former visual encoding relies on traditional map legend, the visual encoding can be selected based on user expert level. Finally, we redesigned layout algorithm to generate a better initial layout. We used evolution algorithm to articulate ambiguity problem of textual cadastre and the result less suffered from overlapping problem. Overall, our visualization design tool will provide an accurate segmentation result, give the user an option to select visual encoding that suits on their expert level, and generate more readable initial layout which gives an overview of cadastre layout.Chapter 1 Introduction 1 1.1 Background & Motivation 1 1.2 Main Contribution 7 1.3 Organization of the Dissertation 8 Chapter 2 Related Work 11 2.1 Map Data Visualization 11 2.2 Graph Layout Algorithms 13 2.3 Collaborative Map Editing Service 14 2.4 Map Image Segmentation 15 2.5 Premodern Cadastral Maps 17 2.6 Assessing Measures for Cartogram 18 Chapter 3 Visualizing and Mapping Premodern Textual Cadasters to Cadastral Maps 20 3.1 Textual Cadastre 21 3.2 Cadastral Maps 24 3.3 Paper-based Mapping Process and Obstacles 24 3.4 Task Flow in JigsawMap 26 3.5 Design Rationale 32 3.6 Evaluation 34 3.7 Discussion 40 3.8 Design Guidelines When Working with Historians 42 Chapter 4 Accurate Segmentation of Land Regions in Historical Cadastral Maps 44 4.1 Segmentation Pipeline 45 4.2 Preprocessing 46 4.3 Removal of Grid Line 48 4.4 Removal of Characters 52 4.5 Reconstruction of Land Boundaries 53 4.6 Generation of Polygons 55 4.7 Experimental Result 56 4.8 Discussion 59 Chapter 5 Approximating Rectangular Cartogram from Premodern Textual Cadastre 62 5.1 Challenges of the Textual Cadastre Layout 62 5.2 Quality Measures for Assessing Rectangular Cartogram 64 5.3 Quality Measures for Assessing Textual Cadastre 65 5.4 Graph Layout Algorithm 66 5.5 Results 72 5.6 Discussion 73 Chapter 6 Design of Scalable Node Representation for a Large Textual Cadastre 78 6.1 Motivation 78 6.2 Visual Encoding in JigsawMa 80 6.3 Challenges of Current Visual Encoding 81 6.4 Compact Visual Encoding 83 6.5 Results 84 6.6 Discussion 86 Chapter 7 Conclusion 88 Bibliography 90 Abstract in Korean 101Docto

Territorializing spatial data: Controlling land through One Map projects in Indonesia and Myanmar

Once confined to paper, national cartographic projects increasingly play out through spatial data infrastructures such as software programs and smartphones. Across the Global South, foreign donor-funded digital platforms emphasize transparency, accountability and data sharing while echoing colonial projects that consolidated statebased territorial knowledge. This article brings political geography scholarship on state and counter-mapping together with new work on the political ecology of data to highlight a contemporary dimension of territorialization, one in which state actors seek to consolidate and authorize national geospatial information onto digital platforms. We call attention to the role of data infrastructures in contemporary resource control, arguing that territorializing data both extends state territorialization onto digital platforms and, paradoxically, provides new avenues for non-state actors to claim land. Drawing on interviews, document review, and long-term fieldwork, we compare the origins, institutionalization and realization of Indonesia and Myanmar’s ‘One Map’ projects. Both projects aimed to create a government-managed online spatial data platform, building on national mapping and management traditions while responding to new international incentives, such as climate change mitigation in Indonesia and good democratic governance in Myanmar. While both projects encountered technical difficulties and evolved during implementation, different national histories and political trajectories resulted in the embrace and expansion of the program in Indonesia but reluctant participation and eventual crisis in Myanmar. Together, these cases show how spatial data infrastructures can both extend state control over space and offer opportunities for contesting or reimagining land and nation, even as such infrastructures remain embedded in local power relations