COURSE UNIT TITLE

: DIGITAL TERRAIN MODELLING

Description of Individual Course Units

Course Unit Code Course Unit Title Type Of Course D U L ECTS
GIS 6002 DIGITAL TERRAIN MODELLING ELECTIVE 2 0 0 7

Offered By

Graduate School of Natural and Applied Sciences

Level of Course Unit

Second Cycle Programmes (Master's Degree)

Course Coordinator

Offered to

GEOGRAPHICAL INFORMATION SYSTEMS
GEOGRAPHICAL INFORMATION SYSTEMS - NON THESIS (EVENING PROGRAM)
GEOGRAPHIC INFORMATION SYSTEMS
Geographical Information Systems (Non-Thesis)

Course Objective

This course will provide students with essentials of DTM generation, their testing for accuracy and reliability. DTM application areas will be discussed on practical examples.

Learning Outcomes of the Course Unit

1   Students will be able to differentiate between different data acquisition methods for DTM generation.
2   They will generate DTMs and they will make basic computations on DTMs
3   They will assess the accuracy of the DTMs. They will be able to test DTMs for reliability.

Mode of Delivery

Face -to- Face

Prerequisites and Co-requisites

None

Recomended Optional Programme Components

None

Course Contents

Week Subject Description
1 Introduction Definitions: Digital Terrain Modeling (DTM), Digital Elevation Modeling (DEM), Digital Surface Modeling (DSM), Digital Terrain Elevation Data (DTED). The need for DTMs Representing the terrain surface
2 DTM Data Acquisition: Surface measurements 2.1. Photogrammetry and remote sensing 2.2. Radar and SAR interferometry 2.3. Airborne and terrestrial laser scanning 2.4. Classical surveying and GNSS methods 2.3 Digitizing existing maps
3 DTM Data Acquisition: Hydrographic measurements 3.1. Airborne LIDAR bathymetry 3.2 Sonar 3.3 Satellite altimetry
4 DTM data structure 4.1. Triangular Irregular network (TIN) 4.2. Contour representation 4.3. Raster or grid representation
5 Generating DTM: TIN Generation 5.1. Principles 5.2. Delaunay Triangulation 5.3. Delaunay Triangulation via Voronoi diagrams
6 Interpolation techniques for DTM generation 6.1 Bilinear interpolation 6.2 Bicubic spline interpolation 6.3 KRIGING
7 DTM Accuracy assessment 7.1 Measures for accuracy 7.2 Tests for DTM accuracy
8 DTM Reliability 8.1 Measures for reliability 8.2 Detection of errors in DTMs
9 Mid-term examination
10 DTM data management 10.1 DTM data with spatial databases 10.2 Standards for DTM data format 10.3 Compression of DTM data 10.4 Integration into GIS
11 DTM Visualization 11.1 Image based visualization 11.2 Rendering techniques 11.3 Animation techniques 11.4 DTM softwares
12 DTM Global data 13.1 GTOPO30 13.2 Shuttle Radar Topography Mission (SRTM) 13.3 The ASTER Global Digital Elevation Model (G-DEM) 13.4 Global Geoid data: Earth Gravity Model (EGM2008)
13 Applications in environmental modeling 14.1 Flood simulation 14.2 Sunlight model 14.3 Agriculture management
14 Applications in civil engineering, mapping, and navigation 15.1 Highway and railway design 15.2 Remote sensing image analysis 15.3 Marine navigation

Recomended or Required Reading

1. Digital Terrain Modeling: Acquisition, Manipulation, and Applications, N El-Sheimy, C Valeo, and A Habin, Artech House, 2005, ISBN: 1580539211.
2. Digital Terrain Modeling: Principles and Methodology, Z Li, Q Zhu, and C Gold, CRC Press, 2005, ISBN: 0415324629.
3. Digital Elevation Model Technologies and Applications: The DEM Users Manual, DF Maune (Ed.), ASPRS Publications, 2007, ISBN: 1570830827.
4. Terrain Modeling in Surveying and Civil Engineering, G Petrie, TJM Kennie, McGraw-Hill, 1990, ISBN: 0070496838.

Planned Learning Activities and Teaching Methods

Projects and presentations

Assessment Methods

SORTING NUMBER SHORT CODE LONG CODE FORMULA
1 ASG ASSIGNMENT
2 MTE MIDTERM EXAM
3 PRJ PROJECT
4 FCG FINAL COURSE GRADE ASG * 0.30 + MTE * 0.40 + PRJ * 0.30


*** Resit Exam is Not Administered in Institutions Where Resit is not Applicable.

Further Notes About Assessment Methods

None

Assessment Criteria

To be announced.

Language of Instruction

English

Course Policies and Rules

To be announced.

Contact Details for the Lecturer(s)

To be announced.

Office Hours

To be announced.

Work Placement(s)

None

Workload Calculation

Activities Number Time (hours) Total Work Load (hours)
Lectures 14 2 28
Preparations before/after weekly lectures 14 5 70
Preparation for midterm exam 1 15 15
Design Project 1 15 15
Preparing assignments 5 5 25
Preparing presentations 2 5 10
Midterm 1 2 2
TOTAL WORKLOAD (hours) 165

Contribution of Learning Outcomes to Programme Outcomes

PO/LOPO.1PO.2PO.3PO.4PO.5PO.6PO.7PO.8PO.9PO.10PO.11
LO.133434434343
LO.243343333343
LO.333334334343