ITT UPDATE ON VISUAL INFORMATION SEGMENT
By Julian Nettlefold, Editor, BATTLESPACE
14 Sep 07. ITT Visual Information Solutions (VIS), previously Research Systems, Inc., was purchased by ITT from Kodak. The company provides integrated software solutions that help scientists, engineers, researchers and medical professionals turn complex data into useful information. The company has 150,000 customers from over 80 countries use IDL, ENVI and IAS to analyze data and imagery and deploy imaging applications.
The main defense product is ENVI
ENVI provides a robust set of features and functionality geared to the defense and intelligence community’s geospatial imagery needs. And, the newest ENVI functionality – including the ENVI Zoom interface – makes it easier than ever for you to read, explore, prepare, analyze, and share geospatial imagery.
ENVI allows the customer to read imagery from numerous satellite and airborne sensors, including panchromatic, multispectral, hyperspectral, radar, thermal, terrain, and Lidar. And, ENVI supports over 70 data formats, including NITF, HDF, and GEOTIFF
ENVI includes easy-to-use tools for virtually any pre-processing need, including:
* Orthorectifying imagery
* Registering two or more images
* Correcting for atmospheric or instrument noise
* Identifying regions of interest (ROIs)
* Creating Digital Elevation Models (DEMs)
Spectral Analysis Tools
ENVI provides the most advanced – yet easy-to-use – spectral analysis tools for:
* Classifying pixels
* Identifying objects and targets using their spectral signatures
* Analyzing and mapping elements of interest
* Identifying vegetation and tracking vegetation-related phenomena
ENVI includes a comprehensive suite of advanced data analysis tools to:
* Extract linear features from imagery
* Detect change in image scenes
* Measure features
* Model topographic characteristics
Integration to the Defense and Intelligence
ENVI features for integrating with defense and intelligence include certified NITF support with the ENVI NITF Module, JPEG200 compression capabilities, bridges to other defense-related applications, such as RemoteVIEW and IAS, and more. And, ENVI’s newest functionality introduces ENVI as a client to Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) and JPEG 2000 Internet Protocol (JPIP) compliant servers.
In May 2007 ESRI and ITT VIS announced a business relationship to develop a certified National Imagery Transmission Format (NITF) extension for ESRI’s ArcGIS platform.
The planned NITF extension will seamlessly integrate with ArcGIS Desktop and ArcGIS Image Server to provide users a proven, certified solution for accessing and creating NITF data, a common raster data format used by the defense and intelligence communities in the United States. The new extension will permit geospatial imagery analysts to read and write NITF data within the ArcGIS environment. In addition, the extension allows analysts to create data products that comply with the NITF specifications and improve the efficiency and timeliness of their workflow.
ITT Visual Information Solutions has extensive experience in understanding and developing NITF products to support its premier image processing platform, ENVI, used extensively in the defense and intelligence communities. The ENVI NITF Module is CLevel 7 certified by the Joint Interoperability Test Command (JITC) and is the tool of choice for many government agencies and corporations using geospatial imagery today.
“Both ESRI and ITT recognize the need to advance the interoperability of enterprise software tools to improve Geospatial and Imagery Analyst workflows,” said Richard Cooke, president and COO, ITT Visual Information Solutions. “The seamless integration of ITT’s ENVI NITF tools into ESRI’s world-class GIS platform will simplify analyst workflows, reduce the time to read and write NITF data, and improve the production of time c