How can digital reality help GIS?

I was asked the other day "Are you no longer a GIS'er?" It made me pause for thought. I've spent most of my career in the GIS world. That choice was driven by the fact it was the best (at one time only) way to solve geospatial problems.

My focus now is on digital reality (thus the question). That move was not me turning my back on GIS. It was driven by my interest in new ways to solve problems. I've waited a long time for geospatial technology to reach the point where we can work with a digital version of our world. And that is digital reality.

Far more than 3D. Digital reality allows us to view any geospatial data: static, real-time, big, small, in a single interface. A web interface!

Web enabled digital reality is very big deal. No longer do we need to learn specialist desktop applications which are expensive and complex. Now we can use simple, focused, easy to access, and use, web apps. Visualize any data in 2D or 3D, and use simple tools to solve problems.

Digital reality opens up a world of new possibilities. Wonderful!

How can digital reality help GIS?

So to the question in the article title. Digital reality; rather than a rival to GIS, actually complements this and other geospatial technologies. How?

Digital reality allows us to combine data from many different sources. GIS is one such source. The video below walks through a simple use case. In this digital reality web app, we combine GIS data, in this case a building and lamp-posts symbolised in 3D, with a LiDAR point cloud. Data QA/QC is the focus here. Comparing the LiDAR and GIS data-sets, highlights inaccuracies in the latter. The video simulates a live session where these inaccuracies can be discussed through a collaborative and remote session. Again all over the web.

This use case just scratches the surface. Digital reality is truly amazing. It allows us to bring together data from different sources and opens up a new world of problem solving possibilities.

You can reach me at matt.sheehan@hexagon.com.