Ancha - We have found that the potential non-ag users represents a 10 to 20 fold or more opportunity for us - thanks ag for the inspiration! >From a little project to help map videoed weeds and bugs we now have a product that is now going ballistic. As a result we have been "encouraged" by our potential distribution partners to push the packaging and technical refinements learned from around 100 units being in the field. We expect release of VMS 2.0 in the first quarter of this year. All current users of VMS technology will be software upgraded as well. (Buy now and get more later.... hmmmm?) All functional VMS 2.0 software enhancements can be downloaded including the operational software and Flash ROM for the hardware when released. We are in the last stages of finishing up our third rev. of the hardware/GPS side. The hardware portion is refined for larger manufacturing runs, has much better power isolation and protection but remains operationally equal to the current model. The software side of the VMS system has been the largest effort as the slice and dice of video is an industry to itself. Expect many improvements in this area. To enable all of the rookie video-mappers to do high accuracy spatial video, we have a nifty new module for post-processing of differentials for GPS. The user will not need a RTCM real-time differential receiver. You can still do real-time differential correction as before if you have the necessary RTCM-105 receiver. For those without, simply make your spatial video, carry it back to the office for its indexization and mapping. The Ez-DIFF(tm) module will automatically reference your local RINEX station or download RINEX correctional information via the internet. This should provide better than three meter accuracy to the VMS spatial multi-media. This required the creation of a new Red Hen Systems product, Ez-DIFF(tm), that will appear in other Red Hen heads-up feet-down map making tools. Of greatest interest to aggies (and essentially eveyone else) has been our integration of laser range and camera heading information into the spatial video index. The VMS200 system can be integrated to several laser range and heading systems. Once the laser is triggered its range, heading, and azimuth to target packet is recorded into the VMS spatial data. This creates an offset from GPS antenna for any target lazed. Police, insurance, community planners and aggie users are going "Wow!" over its ability to quickly document traffic accidents, disaster claims, real estate listings, and that weed patch in the center of the ripe wheat field as well as do on-site "laser precise" measurements. (Hmmm .... don't think of us the next time the photo-speed camera flashes!) In fact when VMS is integrated to higher end or survey grade GPS equipment a rapid survey of an intersection, building location, power lines, bird nests, battlefields, and etc. can be made in minutes with accuracy as high as +/- 10 cm!. And a really cool integration allows the VMS to deliver GPS NMEA strings to both emerging CE and PalmPilot handhelds. A free feature that our users have confirmed on us. Use these nifty map/position display units to get you to your video site or just for general navigation or crop scouting - video included! The VMS desktop software has been tightened up and additional image underlay formats are now supported. Just works better and mostly easier as well as following the industry trends in digital video standards. A real MapX stress test confirming MapInfo's domination of OOM - object oriented mapping. Our manual and WEB site have been upgraded. We have found that the potential internet usage of VMS to be staggering and as a result a VMS mission and all of its spatial video high-lights can be WEB enabled by a single click of its HTML video-map output features. Web post an active map of your crop scouting to your clients! Let the HQ know now what the situation looks like! Click on your field's crop scouting notes and see an image of the problem; count the bugs in the field at the office; look up the leaf diseases at home; go back to the site for a re-evaluation! Pushing the opportunity of "spatial" videocam for your and others on this list, this past Fall we experimented with VMS tied to emerging multispectral CCD (charge coupled device) lens systems. We were able to get on a well calibrated up-close USDA/ARS mulitspectral boom/platform which measures not only refection but ambient conditions as well with one of these emerging CCD devices (about $3500 for a four band device - their rig must have $100,000 invested!). The ARS multispectral boom has been measuring crop stress to irrigation and fertility treatments for several years now. Contact David at Red Hen as this area of VMS appliance may very well be his PhD topic. Combination of these emerging multispectral CCD lens systems, 2, 4, 8, or 16 bands, offers incredible up close calibration of more remote VMS systems time synched to UTM! We have had excellent results from VMS units flown in ulta-light planes or para-sails as well. We have even experimented with a FarmBLIMP(tm) effort too.. Contact Betsy at Red Hen as she has been working with many of the most early users of the VMS system. I guess our most exotic aggie use of VMS has been to document the performance of goats to control weeds in the I-70 corridor of Western Colorado. They actually did a very good job. FYI Red Hen Systems 1/13/99 970-493-3952 http://www.redhensystems.com Ancha Srinivasan wrote: > Dear colleagues, > > I am looking for reviews of Video Mapping System VMS 200 (Red Hen > Systems/Farmers' Software Association). If you are aware of any third > party evaluations of the software and its application in precision > agriculture in any crop, please inform me ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) and/or post > such details on this list. > > Thank you for your time. > > Ancha Srinivasan ---------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe from this list, send e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] and put "unsubscribe MAPINFO-L" in the message body, or contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
