OpenTopography Blog

Information and discussion related to high-resolution LiDAR topography for the Earth sciences

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Category: Workshops

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Charting the Future of Terrestrial Laser Scanning Workshop Report Available

Posted on Sat, January 07, 2012 by Chris Crosby in TLS • Workshops

Before the holidays, UNAVCO announced the release of the preliminary report from the Community Workshop: Charting the Future of Terrestrial Laser Scanning (TLS) in the Earth Sciences and Related Fields.  Also available on the UNAVCO site are all presentations and breakout materials from the workshop. 

OpenTopography was an active part of this workshop and we are very interested in data product, format, and metadata standards for TLS data.  We plan to work closely with UNAVCO to facilitate access to TLS datasets via OpenTopography, and will use this report in part to guide our development activities.  As a reminder, OT already hosts several TLS datasets which can be accessed at the bottom of the list on our Point Cloud and Custom DEM page.

Comments and feedback on the report are welcome and encouraged.  Please send them to David Phillips: 

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Knowledge Exchange Workshop on Terrestrial Laser Scanning

Posted on Fri, January 06, 2012 by Chris Crosby in Meetings • TLS • Workshops

Via the Geomorphlist, an announcement about a terrestrial laser scanning workshop being held April 2012 at the University of Leicester, UK.  The “Knowledge exchange workshop on terrestrial laser scanning” is being organized by the Earth Observation Technology Cluster at the University of Nottingham.

Knowledge exchange workshop on terrestrial laser scanning
April 2-3 2012

As part of the NERC EO Technology Cluster Lidarnet project we are planning a 2 day workshop at the University of Leicester, UK.  The workshop aims to attract a cross section of people from researchers, through applications specialists, instrument developers and vendors. We plan to have a mix of activities including key-note talks, an applications poster session, hands-on demonstrations, and interactive discussions.

For further information see:
http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/eotechcluster/events/knowledge-exchange-workshop-on-terrestrial-laser-scanning.aspx

or email LiDARnet@le.ac.uk

Dr Nick Tate
Department of Geography
University of Leicester.

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Short Course: Imaging and Analyzing Southern California’s Active Faults with Lidar

Posted on Wed, September 14, 2011 by Chris Crosby in Education • OpenTopography Updates • Workshops

Mike Oskin (UC Davis), Ramon Arrowsmith (ASU), and I will be teaching a lidar short course October 24 and 25, 2011 at University of California, Davis.  The course, Imaging and Analyzing Southern California’s Active Faults with High-Resolution Lidar Topography, will focus on lidar technology, data processing and analysis techniques. We will emphasize fault trace and geomorphic mapping applications, integration with other geospatial data, and data visualization and analysis approaches.  The course will be held at KeckCAVES at UC Davis and will combine lectures and hands-on use of several different software packages.

The course is supported by the Southern California Earthquake Center, UC Davis KeckCAVES, and OpenTopography.

More information on the course and a link to the course application are available via the short course page.  The application deadline is September 21st, 2011.

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Charting the Future of Terrestrial Laser Scanning (TLS) in the Earth Sciences and Related Fields

Posted on Sun, August 07, 2011 by Chris Crosby in TLS • Workshops

Community Workshop Announcement:

CHARTING THE FUTURE OF TERRESTRIAL LASER SCANNING (TLS) IN THE EARTH SCIENCES AND RELATED FIELDS

This workshop will be held at the Millennium Harvest House Hotel in Boulder, Colorado on October 17-19, 2011.

Workshop registration is now open. To register and apply for support please visit: http://www.unavco.org/community/meetings-events/2011/tls/tls.html

Terrestrial Laser Scanning (TLS), a.k.a. terrestrial LiDAR, is part of a suite of new geodetic imaging technologies that are becoming increasingly important to the Earth science and related communities for use in myriad research applications. The overarching goals for this workshop are community oriented and include:

• Engage TLS users across Earth science subdisciplines and related fields such as engineering, ecology, and anthropology.
• Seed planning that is inspired by recent innovative science applications.
• Identify future TLS research directions and the appropriate structures, resources and collaborations to support them.
• Define user requirements to guide community members, facilities and sponsors in planning and seeking resources to provide research-grade data products as efficiently and effectively as possible.

To advance these goals, the following thematic workshop sessions are planned:

• TLS science applications.
• TLS data processing and analysis.
• TLS data and metadata formats and standards.
• Best structures and practices for community-oriented facilities providing TLS hardware, software, and data.
• Comprehensive outlook and plan to support future TLS developments and community requirements.

We particularly seek to draw upon the experience and expertise of researchers who are familiar with the current capabilities and challenges of TLS technologies and methodologies and who are interested in advancing these goals. To help represent a broader target audience and to enrich and diversify the workshop’s planning, content and deliverables, the Organizing Committee is recruiting community representatives to serve as additional organizing committee members and/or session chairs.

This workshop is funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF) and organized by UNAVCO. Workshop deliverables are meant to be relevant to TLS users at all levels, from individual investigators to large scale initiatives, and will be particularly useful as strategic aids to help NSF supported facilities such as UNAVCO, INTERFACE, OpenTopography and NCALM best meet the needs of the research community now and in the future.

The registration deadline is September 2, 2011.

On behalf of the workshop Organizing Committee, thank you for your interest and we hope to see you in Boulder in October!

David Phillips

WORKSHOP ORGANIZING COMMITTEE:

David Phillips, UNAVCO
John Oldow, University of Texas at Dallas
Doug Walker, University of Kansas
Ramon Arrowsmith, Arizona State University
Chuck Meertens, UNAVCO

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David A. Phillips, Ph.D.
Geodetic Imaging Project Manager
UNAVCO
6350 Nautilus Drive, Boulder, CO 80301
Tel: 303-381-7471, Fax: 303-381-7451
phillips@unavco.org
http://www.unavco.org

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Lidar Short Course at 2011 Geological Society of America Meeting

Posted on Sat, July 16, 2011 by Chris Crosby in Meetings • Workshops

Ian Madin (Oregon Department of Geology and Mineral Industries) and I will be teaching an introductory lidar short course at the 2011 Geological Society of America annual meeting in Minneapolis in October. 

Details from the GSA Short Course page:

514. Introduction to the Acquisition, Visualization, and Interpretation of Airborne LiDAR Data

Sat., 8 Oct., 8 a.m.-5 p.m.
$110. Limit: 30. CEU: 0.9.
Cosponsors: OpenTopography; GSA Quaternary Geology and Geomorphology Division; GSA Structural Geology and Tectonics Division; GSA Environmental and Engineering Geology Division; GSA Geoinformatics Divisions.
Ian Madin, Oregon Dept. of Geology and Mineral Industries; Chris Crosby, Univ. of California at San Diego.

This course provides and introduction to the acquisition and use of airborne LiDAR data. It covers LiDAR collection fundamentals, how to contract for good data, where to find data and tools, how to visualize point and grid data, and how to do simple feature extraction from LiDAR-derived DEMs. The course will use ESRI ArcGIS and USFS Fusion software, and each student will have a dedicated workstation and real world data to use in hands-on exercises.

In this one-day course we’ll emphasize the basics of lidar technology, the overall data collection, processing and analysis workflow, and will provide a hands-on introduction to working with both point cloud and gridded data products.  The course is appropriate for faculty, graduate students, and geoscience professionals who are interested in applying lidar topography data to their work.

This course will be similar to the one we taught at the 2009 GSA meeting in Portland.  Materials from that course can be found in the OpenTopography Short Courses section.  The 2009 course was at capacity, so register early.

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Geomorphic Change Detection Workshop

Posted on Wed, April 13, 2011 by Chris Crosby in Workshops

Via Joe Wheaton at Utah State comes this announcement on an upcoming workshop he’ll be leading on using repeat topographic data to detect geomorphic change.  Joe has been leading the development of the Geomorphic Change Detection (GCD) software package and has spent a lot of time thinking about uncertainties in digital elevation models and how those uncertainties impact the ability to detect real geomorphic change between surveys.  The workshop is offered as part of the Stream Restoration course series offered by USU.

Restoration Monitoring: Geomorphic Change Detection Workshop

May 12-13, 2011, in Park City, Utah

This intensive 2-day workshop will give participants an understanding of the theory and tools used to detect geomorphic change based on repeat topographic data using a variety of ground-based and remotely-sensed surveying technologies.

The workshop will be a mix of formal lectures, computer-based lab activities, and discussion sections. The cost for the course is $700 and includes instruction, software, class materials and some meals.

Instruction will be lead by Joe Wheaton (Utah State University), Philip Bailey (ESSA Technologies) and Jack Schmidt (Utah State University).

The workshop is intended for individuals who are charged with interpreting and/or designing geomorphic monitoring campaigns with repeat topography. The course focuses less on the field acquisition of data and more on the analysis and interpretation of that data.  Participants will gain a working knowledge of how to apply the newly-developed Geomorphic Change Detection software (GCD 5).  Participants are expected to have a basic working knowledge of ArcGIS.

Background
Geomorphic change detection is a technique by which changes from the geomorphic processes of erosion and deposition are inferred from repeat topographic surveys. Due to the quantitative and spatially explicit results it yields, geomorphic change detection is rapidly becoming a more common tool in the monitoring of rivers and in particular restoration monitoring. The biggest challenge in employing such techniques is quantitatively distinguishing changes due to geomorphic processes from those changes due to noise and uncertainty inherent in the digital elevation models.

Participants will learn how to segregate calculated changes due to noise from those that might represent the geomorphic processes being monitored. Case study examples will be drawn from baseline monitoring and post-project monitoring of restoration projects. See here for more information.

Space is limited so register early.

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Workshops on Interoperability/Technology and Education/Outreach aspects of Geoinformatics

Posted on Fri, July 30, 2010 by Chris Crosby in Workshops

The following workshop, to be held September 23 and 24, 2010 at the USGS-Denver Federal Center, may be of interest to the OpenTopography community and researchers working on geoinformatics:

Workshops on Interoperability/Technology and Education/Outreach aspects of Geoinformatics - working towards a National Geoinformatics Community

Workshop overview:
Building on the experience gathered from previous workshops on geoinformatics, the academic community has the opportunity to be directly involved in planning and coordinating future efforts in geoinformatics research and learning.  The main objectives of these workshops are to identify the best ways to integrate and share data and knowledge from different fields in the geosciences, focus geoinformatics research and education priorities, and build a National Geoinformatics Community (NGC).  Important to this is to address aspects related to interoperability/technology and education/outreach.  The vision for NGC is to advance geoinformatics at all levels via outreach, advocacy, and fostering communities of practice. The NGC concept has evolved from numerous workshops, town hall meetings, and the work of an exploratory committee in meetings with existing and successful community efforts such as UNAVCO, IRIS, Ocean Leadership (formerly JOI), and CUAHSI.

We invite participation in the two-day workshop to establish the National Geoinformatics Community.  The first day and a half will be run as two parallel, separate workshops: one for interoperability/technology and the other for education/outreach.  The two groups will meet for the last half-day to review results and plan for future activities and establishing the NGC.  The workshops will be held at the USGS, Denver Federal Center, Denver, CO.

More information about the workshop and application information are available at: http://ngc.usgin.org/WorkshopsOnInteroperability.htm

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Application deadline change: New Tools in Process-Based Analysis of Lidar Topographic Data

Posted on Fri, March 12, 2010 by Chris Crosby in Workshops

Note that due to the large number of applicants, the deadline for applying to the “New Tools in Process-Based Analysis of Lidar Topographic Data” workshop has been moved up to 9 AM EST on Monday, March 15:

Dear Colleagues,

On March 7th, we announced an upcoming workshop titled

“New Tools in Process-Based Analysis of Lidar Topographic Data,”

to be held June 1-2 in Boulder, CO.

Since then we received a very large number of applications (more than three
times the number of available spaces in the workshop), and must close the
application process prior to the previously listed April 1 deadline.  The
official application period now will end at 9 AM EST on Monday, March 15.
Later this month, we will contact all applicants via email regarding the
status of their applications. Thank you all for your great interest in the
lidar workshop!

Regards,

Dorothy and Noah

Dorothy Merritts (Franklin and Marshall College, dorothy.merritts@fandm.edu)
Noah Snyder (Boston College, noah.snyder@bc.edu)

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Workshop Announcement: New Tools in Process-Based Analysis of Lidar Topographic Data

Posted on Mon, March 08, 2010 by Chris Crosby in Workshops

Please see the following announcement for an upcoming NSF-sponsored workshop on “New Tools in Process-Based Analysis of Lidar Topographic Data,” to be held June 1-2 at the University Corporation for Atmospheric Research (UCAR) in Boulder, Colorado.  The goal of the workshop is to “provide researchers in Earth surface processes with an opportunity to gain hands-on knowledge in new methods for analyzing high-resolution topographic data. Participants should have active research projects using lidar data (airborne or ground-based). Graduate students, faculty and other researchers are encouraged to attend”.

Dear Colleagues,

You are invited to participate in an NSF-sponsored workshop called “New Tools in Process-Based Analysis of Lidar Topographic Data,” to be held June 1-2 at the University Corporation for Atmospheric Research (UCAR) in Boulder, Colorado. This workshop is a follow-up to one held in 2008 called “Workshop on Studying Earth Surface Processes with High-resolution Topographic Data”. The goal of this year’s workshop is to provide researchers in Earth surface processes with an opportunity to gain hands-on knowledge in new methods for analyzing high-resolution topographic data. Participants should have active research projects using lidar data (airborne or ground-based). Graduate students, faculty and other researchers are encouraged to attend.

The format over the two days will include four three-hour workshop timeslots (with two workshops running concurrently in each), two plenary lectures by interdisciplinary experts in analysis of lidar data (Michael Lefsky from Colorado State University and Ralph Haugerud from the USGS- Seattle), and short presentations and posters by all workshop participants.

Funding will be provided by NSF for rooms, some meals, and the workshop itself for approximately 40-50 participants. It is up to each participant to get to Boulder.

To reserve a place at the workshop, please email the organizers (dorothy.merritts@fandm.edu and noah.snyder@bc.edu) the following information by April 1, 2010:

1. Name
2. Title (graduate student, professor, postdoc, researcher, etc.)
3. One sentence description of your lidar-related research

We anticipate the workshop spaces filling rapidly, so reply ASAP. Please feel free to forward this email to colleagues who might be interested.

Please contact us if you have questions.

Workshop organizers:
Dorothy Merritts (Franklin and Marshall College, dorothy.merritts@fandm.edu)
Noah Snyder (Boston College, noah.snyder@bc.edu)

New Tools in Process-Based Analysis of Lidar Topographic Data

University Corporation for Atmospheric Research (UCAR)
Boulder, Colorado, USA
June 1-2, 2010

Workshop sessions

1.  Title:  The River Bathymetry Toolkit

Leaders: Jim McKean and Dave Nagel (U.S. Forest Service, Rocky Mountain Research Station, Boise); and Philip Bailey (ESSA Technologies Ltd.)

Description: This workshop presents the River Bathymetry Toolkit (RBT), which processes high-resolution DEMs of channels and calculates standard measures of hydraulic geometry and aquatic habitat at user-defined locations. (Note: this workshop will be presented twice.)

2.  Title:  Filtering and quantitative analysis of lidar data

Leaders:  Steve Martel (University of Hawaii) and Taylor Perron (MIT)

Description:  This workshop will present methods for filtering and smoothing lidar data to detect and remove outliers, to diminish noise, and to detect and enhance signals.

3.  Title:  Identifying and mapping landforms and quantifying fault displacement with lidar digital topographic data

Leaders:  Ramon Arrowsmith (ASU); Kurt Frankel (Georgia Tech); and Ralph Haugerud (USGS/University of Washington)

Description:  A hands on and applied workshop on mapping, designed to bridge from academic to agency and industry communities. Workshop will include reference to activities underway by California Geological Survey and Oregon DOGAMI.

4.  Title:  Extracting landscape metrics for tectonic interpretation

Leaders:  George Hilley (Stanford University) and Ramon Arrowsmith (ASU)

Description:  This workshop includes the wavelet analysis of high resolution digital topography and the calculation of area-slope based metrics across DEMs with different spatial resolutions.

5.  Title:  1D hydraulic modeling with lidar data

Leader:  Noah Finnegan (UC- Santa Cruz)

Description:  This workshop will present the basics of 1) generating input files from lidar data for use with the 1D hydraulic modeling package HEC-RAS, and 2) Performing simple lidar-based open channel flow calculations in HEC-RAS.

6.  Title:  Meaningful Change Detection and Sediment Budgeting from Repeat Topographic Data

Leader: Joseph Wheaton (Utah State University)

Description: As repeat topographic data sets become an increasingly popular form of scientific monitoring, the need grows for robust methods of quantifying and accounting for uncertainties in those data to reliably distinguish between calculated changes likely to be real versus those changes one cannot distinguish from noise. Once the uncertainties in repeat topographic data sets are accounted for, the more interesting question of how to interpret the data and use it to test specific hypotheses remains. In this session, participants will learn how to use the DEM of Difference Uncertainty Analysis Software to do both an uncertainty analysis of repeat topographic datasets and interpret the data in terms of sediment budgets.

More Information: http://www.joewheaton.org/Home/research/projects-1/morphological-sediment-budgeting

7.  Title:  GeoNet: A computational tool for channel extraction from lidar

Leader:  Paola Passalacqua (National Center for Earth-Surface Dynamics, University of Minnesota)

Description:  GeoNet is an advanced methodology for channel network extraction, which incorporates nonlinear diffusion for the pre-processing of the data and geodesic energy minimization for the extraction of channels.  This 3-hour workshop will combine a lecture with hands-on practice. The lecture will introduce the theoretical background, and the hands-on portion will focus on the application of GeoNet to basins of different geomorphologic characteristics.

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On the Cutting Edge workshop on Using GIS and Remote Sensing to Teach Geoscience

Posted on Sat, March 06, 2010 by Chris Crosby in Education • Workshops

I received the following announcement from Barb Tewksbury at Hamilton about an upcoming series of On the Cutting Edge workshops that they are hosting on the topics of Teaching Geoscience Using GIS and Remote Sensing and Teaching Geoscience in the Field in the 21st Century.  Certainly the GIS and remote sensing course is very applicable to many users of OpenTopography, and combined with the field course should be an excellent week in Bozeman, MT.  Note that the application deadline is March 20, 2010.  All the details:

On the Cutting Edge will offer two back-to-back workshops at Montana State University, Bozeman, MT in August, 2010:

Teaching Geoscience Using GIS and Remote Sensing (August 8-11)
Teaching Geoscience in the Field in the 21st Century (August 13-16)

The day between the workshops (August 12) will be an optional overlap day for both workshops and will focus on teaching in the field using GeoPads. The Field workshop will be followed by an optional field trip in the Yellowstone area (August 17-19).

Faculty may apply to attend either or both workshops. We are looking for applicants who currently teach GIS, remote sensing, or field geology to undergraduate geoscience students. Please note that the GIS/RS workshop is not a workshop to train faculty in the technical use of GIS systems – we are looking for people who currently teach GIS/RS and are interested in exploring effective ways of meeting the needs of geoscience students.

Application must be made online by March 20, 2010. Complete information about the workshops plus online applications can be found at:

http://serc.carleton.edu/NAGTWorkshops/gis10/index.html
http://serc.carleton.edu/NAGTWorkshops/field/workshop10/index.html

If you have questions, please email Barb Tewksbury (btewksbu@hamilton.edu) about the GIS/RS workshop or Dave Mogk (mogk@montana.edu) about the Field workshop.

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