Carving a Niche
Virginia-based constructor of GIS databases foresees a coming of convenience with the advent of their off-the-shelf digital orthophoto products.
By Mary Jo Wagner

Greg Tilley, president of Vargis LLC in Herndon, Va., is not surprised that many counties are not thrilled about geographic information systems. He's not surprised that they don't share in the excitement of those who have found its potential and developed efficient management systems. It's no wonder, he says.
      "GIS at the county and municipal level has been a backroom operation," he says. "Vector data capture is so tedious and expensive that by the time any one piece of data actually hits a county's desktop, the products are at least two to three years old, sometimes five. It's no wonder that public works or public safety or any other office that has to wait that long to get the data is not really excited about it. That's why GIS has rarely made it out of the planning group."
      What makes Tilley's observation worse is that the majority of GIS users are in those same county and municipal agencies that are struggling to produce useful databases. And the potential of the private sector has yet to be tapped.
      But Vargis hopes all that will change.
      Although Vargis, constructor of commercial high definition GIS databases, only formed one year ago, it's been in business long enough to recognize the direction they feel GIS needs to take for the industry to grow.
      Vargis foresees a coming of convenience for both map providers and GIS end users with the advent of their off-the-shelf digital orthophoto products.
      "Anybody that ever used a paper map will be able to use our digital maps better, faster and cheaper," says John Veatch, managing director of Vargis. That's the whole idea.
      "We believe GIS hasn't made it out into the mainstream commercial market yet because quality off-the-shelf data does not exist," says Tilley. "And until quality, large-scale data is available in ready-made form, then GIS really will not fulfill its promise."
      On those beliefs, this young company began carving out its niche in the digital orthophoto market, producing data at 1:12,000 scales and larger of select geographic areas. Six months later they launched their first products, VARDOQ and VARBASE.
      Veatch says the products will be a cartographic aid to both the occasional and frequent map user. "Whereas most people consider an accurate map as being one that can get them from one side of the community to the other, our maps allow people to get from one side of their patio to the other."

VARDOQ AND VARBASE
The VARDOQ product offers a map scale of 1:12,000 with a ground resolution of 1 meter. Created in color infrared, each image covers the area of one quarter of a USGS 7.5' quad map. It is available in almost any file format including Arc/Info, Intergraph and TIFF and is delivered on CD-ROM or 8 mm tape. The projection of the product is State Plane or UTM, but it can be converted to any projection specified. And each product comes with stand alone viewing software and metadata.
      Presently, VARDOQ products cover substantial areas of Virginia, created with exclusive aerial photography acquired by Vargis in March of 1995. They plan to expand the product coverage to other areas across the country in 1996.
      Because VARDOQ digital orthophotos are produced in color infrared, Tilley says it is very useful for environmental applications. Growing vegetation can be easily identified as those areas appear very red. The black of water helps to distinguish shore lines. Color infrared can aid in forest differentiation, particularly between coniferous and deciduous trees. And soil moisture can also be detected because wet or damp soil will appear darker than dry soil.
      If you're interested in Maryland, Virginia and the District of Columbia then Vargis offers the VARBASE color digital orthophoto product. Other markets have been targeted for acquisition as well in 1996.
      Created from exclusive aerial photography acquired last spring, the VARBASE has a map scale of 1:1,000. It has a ground resolution of .2 meters (7 inches) with a tile size of 800 x 800 meters.
      Similar to the VARDOQ products, VARBASE products are also available in any specified file format and projection and sold on CD-ROM or 8 mm tape.
      The resolution and scale of a VARBASE make it a versatile mapping tool, particularly in urban areas, says Tilley.
     "The only user community that the VARBASE does not satisfy is the final design engineering field where they need map scales down to 1 inch equals 50 feet or larger," he says. "But we capture every other potential user at the level we are targeting."

THE MARKET
Now Vargis just has to sell these products to the market. And that market is not just the traditional map makers and map providers. They see their digital orthophotos snapping into other unique commercial sectors such as real estate.
      Vargis believes their ready-made digital orthophotos will not just create convenience for the real estate agent or assessor, but for the home buyer as well. Just how convenient? Consider this. Imagine being able to walk into a real estate office to buy a house. Instead of obtaining a list of homes to investigate and driving around for hours, you are able to browse through hundreds of homes, in 3-D, and to select the ones you like from the comfort of the office.
      Imagine being able to see where the playground is, the school is, the shopping center is, or whether the neighbor has trash lying in the backyard, all from a computer screen. Imagine even being able to see your chosen home in the future, if it will be the site for a major thoroughfare, for example, before buying it.
      Satisfying the requirements for land title surveys will be easier as well.
      "I developed a system which will allow agents to access our database and order a land title survey, which is used for title insurance and mortgage underwriting purposes, directly through their multiple listing services," says Veatch. "They can use our source data as the underlying image for the survey."
      "Homes could be sold in a couple of weeks instead of the two or three months it takes now," adds Tilley.
      Whether it's real estate, farming or engineering, Vargis believes their products' potential will be noted.
      "There is a growing recognition in the GIS community that digital orthophotos will replace a lot of the tedious vector maps that are presently being used," says Veatch. "The mere fact that in 1/250th of a second, a high precision aerial camera can capture more than a busload of surveyors in a month is a decided economic advantage."

ADVANTAGES
One of the most significant advantages of Vargis' products is its availability. If a client orders a digital orthophoto already archived, it can be delivered overnight. They are also in the process of developing an on-line browsing system, allowing users to preview data before ordering it. If the needed product is not on the shelf, Tilley says customers can receive custom-ordered products in less than a year, depending on the flying season and the area of interest. That's still faster than the conventional way.
      Traditionally, counties submit a request for proposal to obtain digital orthophotos, and they can wait two to five years to receive their product. Consequently the product is already out of date by the time it arrives, says Tilley.
     Fairfax County in Virginia is a prime example of how several years of strife was ended in a few months.
      "Fairfax County had been struggling for seven years to get a GIS up and running," explains Veatch. "We received a purchase order for datasets from them in July and we delivered their first datasets in September."
      Vargis will also continually update the data, performing aerial surveys as often as annually in some areas. The maximum update cycle would be three years, says Tilley.
      Cost-effectiveness is another positive aspect of Vargis' digital orthophoto products. A GIS can be an expensive project to build and can be labor-intensive. Off-the-shelf digital orthophotos can be a solution to that problem.
      "When you think about the level of effort it takes to send people into the field to collect site-specific information that already resides within our image, there is a signficant savings, not only in manpower, but also in time, because you're able to get immediate access to that information," says Veatch.
      In terms of real dollars, Vargis' goal is to provide their products at less than acquisition cost by spreading the expense out over a longer period and over more than one user. In some cases, Tilley says, clients may be able to obtain data at one-tenth the acquisition cost.
      For example, a county in Virginia that is leasing data from Vargis is paying a set amount of money for a six-year period. Vargis produces and maintains the data, and provides two updates of areas that the county chooses throughout the six years.
      "In this way it becomes more of a maintenance cost, just like your GIS software license with an annual maintenance fee,"says Tilley. "It takes all the agony away from them so they can do with the data what they'd intended all along: use it."
      As Vargis acquires data over entire regions, county and municipal agencies using VARDOQ or VARBASE products will be at an advantage because they will all have the same basemap. Tilley says that will also reduce the cost of the digital orthophoto because it will be spread out among many users. And a standard basemap will enable departments to share information, producing a more detailed database.

FUTURE DEVELOPMENTS
In addition to scheduling aerial surveys over major metropolitan areas in 1996, Vargis plans to develop other ready-made products that would contain specific information such as street center lines and addresses.
      They are also collaborating with software companies to create point and click software solutions that would allow their high resolution datasets to work with quick "refresh" times and very little disk storage on a desktop system.
      And they are also discussing the possibility of embedding their data in GIS software, creating various turnkey systems for both commercial and municipal agencies. Vargis sees endless possibilities.
      But for now, Vargis is sticking with their initial focus on ready-made digital orthophotos. They may not be the solution to every county's problem, but they may be just the excitement the county needs.
      "Digital orthophotos are the most comprehensive basemap you can find," says Tilley. "They are, in essence, a complete GIS in themselves."

About the Author:
Mary Jo Wagner is a freelance writer/editor who writes about GIS and remote sensing. She may be reached at 415-291-8292.

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