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NearMap Release Soon
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The chief executive of Perth-based photomap media company, NearMap, says the company will launch a new internet portal to display the company's imagery within the next few months. Nixon says NearMap is a vehicle to launch the next generation of Earth image technology. The imagery is sourced from NearMap's HyperPod aerial camera system. He describes it as 'a multi-resolution virtual camera' capable of generating both nadir and oblique views. It generates about a gigabyte of raw data every second. It is the subject of a new patent. |
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HyperVision software – which runs on supercomputer clusters distributed by the HyperWeb – processes the bit stream from the HyperPod into a seamless image of the area. It is an engine for mosaicing large amounts of very high definition imagery using the massive redundancy possible with digital images.
Nixon has been mapping Perth, Australia, on a monthly basis for 18 months. He said he would like to have imagery of other capitals on the site before it is launched.
Nixon says he wants to go after the online media market, not the spatial industry. Although the business model calls for direct licensing of the data to government and industry, the really big market is likely to be in location-sensitive online advertising. The imagery will be free of copyright to consumers and to companies who wish to embed it in location-aware products.
He also says he is interested in crowdsourcing of map data. He says the copyright notices were specially written to accommodate the concerns of organisations such as OpenMap, which are attempting to create maps of the world using amateur map makers. Such an operation would be much easier if people were able to, for instance, lift road centrelines off the imagery.
