Assign Spatial Location to Digital Images

Use ProjectWise spatial to manage your Digital Images

by Jim.Phillips@Bentley.com

Prerequisites

• ProjectWise Explorer and ProjectWise Geospatial Explorer SELECTseries 2 or later (You can upgrade Explorer to SELECTseries 2 or 3 if you have ProjectWise Integration Server SELECTseries 1 or later)
• ProjectWise Administrator and ProjectWise Geospatial Administrator SELECTseries 2 or later
• A ProjectWise spatial or geospatial background map on which the spatial location of the images displays
• The LL84 geographic coordinate system must be available in ProjectWise

• Digital images

• A method of assigning geotag data to the digital images as explained within

What’s in it for you

If you have used a digital camera to capture field conditions and want to organize them to promote efficiency consider using ProjectWise spatial functions.  Images from digital cameras can be georeferenced in ProjectWise  just like your CAD drawings, maps, and areal images. New in ProjectWise SELECTseries 2, the Scan Spatial Locations… tool can be used to spatially locate digital images.  The images geotag data is mapped to ProjectWise attributes and then just run the scanner using the Extract Location from scanned images tagsoption.

Documents in ProjectWise having a spatial location can be easily located by using the search tool to define an area that is used to constrain the search along with other criteria.  Another way to find spatially located images is to just open the folder that contains the images and use the Spatial/Geospatial view in Explorer to zoom in and visually examine the map to locate the images according to their spatial location.

In a separate functionality, thumbnails can be displayed in Explorer by toggling the preview pain on and using the Preview tab.  Or, just select the Thumbnails option in the View menu. Images do not display the thumbnail until they are successfully scanned for spatial location.

 Geotag Background Info

The source of images that contain tagdata can be from a digital camera, a scanner, phone camera, or any digital image that supports the Exif tagdata.  I checked my images from old pictures that were scanned, digital cameras from 2005 and later, and my cheap old phone camera.  All contained Exif tagdata.  Some of the tags hold GPS data, others relate to the camera, the shutter speed, aperture, date taken and much more.

The simplest way to view the tagdata is to use Window Explorer.  Using Windows 7, the Windows Explorer properties of digital camera files display the tag data in the Details tab as shown below.  Using my Windows XP machine there is no Details tab and the same information is not available.

If you don’t have a Windows 7 computer, free software can display the tag data.  MicrosoftPro Photo Tools is a free download.  Using it, if the format does not support Exif tagdata an error message is displayed.

 Here’s how to view tagdata of an image using Pro Photo Tools

• After opening the app, simply drag images from Windows Explorer into the Thumbnails pane on the right.
• Select an image and view the data values in the left pane by category.  They can be edited.

Tagdata refers to the Exif specification.  This is from the Wikipedia website.

Exchangeable image file format (Exif) is a specification for the image file format used bydigital cameras (including smartphones) and scanners. The specification uses the existingJPEG, TIFF Rev. 6.0, and RIFF WAV file formats, with the addition of specific metadata tags. It is not supported in JPEG 2000, PNG, or GIF

There are several ways to assign values to the geotags in an image file.

Tag data is assigned to all images using, it seems, any digital camera.  If you want the spatial location information assigned by the camera, it must have GPS capability.  There are many new cameras with this feature.  Otherwise a separate application is used to assign the latitude and longitude data and optionally the altitude: Some applications are: Microsoft Pro Photo Tools (freeware), Geosetter (freeware), Picassa and Google Earth (also freeware).

The use of Microsoft’s free Pro Photo Tools is explained here to edit geotag data. It is a free downloaded available from Microsoft and elsewhere.

General steps to spatially locate digital images in ProjectWise

1. Assign geotag data to the subject images
2. Import the images into ProjectWise
3. Use ProjectWise Administrator to create a ProjectWise Environment containing attributes that can be mapped to the geotag data (one time only step)
4. Use ProjectWise Administrator to map the geotags to the ProjectWise attributes by creating a Raster Metadata Attribute Mapping (one time only step)
5. Assign the Environment to the ProjectWise folder containing the images
6. Assign the spatial location to the images using the Scan Spatial Locations… tool

1. Assign geotag data to images

To Edit tagdata using Pro Photo Tools

• In the far left pane, expand Tasks > Metadata > Image
• Select any node and enter the desired values
• Click the Save selected image(s) toolbar button to save the changes

To assign the spatial location to the tag data

• With images loaded, use the interactive map to zoom in to the location to be assigned.
• Drag and drop one or more images to that location.  In the far left pane, expand  Tasks > Metadata > Image > Location and note the addition of the latitude and longitude GPS Data in the middle pane.
• Alternatively, if you know the lat/long: with the Location node opened, key in the Location information and click the Get GPS info command button.
• There is also an address look up feature that assigns the latitude/longitude values for any address that can be resolved.

OR use Picasa with Google Earth to assign the spatial location tag data to an image.

• Open Picasa and select the picture or pictures.
• Then click on the Geo-Tag button along the bottom of Picasa.
• Google Earth will open.  Navigate to the location using the cross hairs.

Click the Geotag button to assign the spatial tags.  Then click Done.

2. Import the images into ProjectWise

3. Create a ProjectWise Environment

For specific help open ProjectWise Administrator.  From Help menu selectEnvironments, Attributes, and Interfaces > Setting up Environments >Creating Environments.

First create the attributes.  Refer to ProjectWise Geospatial Administrator Help >Using ProjectWise Geospatial Management Implementation > Attribute Mappings > Create Raster Metadata Attribute Mapping.  There you can just follow the illustration to create attributes as shown.  Make sure all the data types are CHAR and long enough to hold ALL the data.

Then create the interface adding and positioning the attributes as desired.

4. Define the Raster Metadata Attribute Mapping

•  Open ProjectWise Administrator and login to the datasource that contains the images and Environment.

• Right click on Attribute Mapping and select Create Raster Metadata Attribute Mapping…

• • Select the Image Data Environment created in step 3
  •  To map the ProjectWise Attributes to the appropriate Tag names:  Click the empty tag field and select the appropriate tag from the list.

       NOTE: to see more tags click the last option <More…>

       

           The final mapping could look like this.

       

  •  Click OK when mapping is complete.

  5. Assign the Environment to the ProjectWise folder

  The image environment created in step three is assigned to a folder or project.  By doing so, all documents within inherit that environment.

  • Simply right click on the folder or project
  • Select Properties
  • Open the General tab
  • Use the drop down list to select and assign the Environment

  6. Scan the Images to assign Spatial Locations

  • Log into ProjectWise Explorer
  • From the Tools menu, select Scan Spatial Locations…
  • Click Next
  • Select the image or images to be scanned, Click Next
  • Select the Extract Location from scanned images tags option
  • To assign ProjectWise attribute values from the tags check the Extract Metadata from scanned images option.

      

  NOTE: For specific help open ProjectWise Explorer.  From Help menu selectProjectWise Geospatial Management Explorer V8i (SELECT series 3 (or 2)) Help: Using ProjectWise Geospatial Management Explorer > Assigning Spatial Locations > Spatial Scanning and Loading.  The link Extraction Options provides details of the options in the Spatial Locations Scanning Tool Metadata Extraction Options dialog shown above.

  • Step through the rest of the Wizard and click the Start Scan button

  The results indicate both spatial location assignment and attribute assignment.

  

  Enjoy the result

  In ProjectWise Explorer select the Spatial or Geospatial view.  As you hover over the pin icon, or other shape if that is the option you chose, and the file names are listed.

  

  Try assigning a spatial criteria to a search to locate the images.