SIGNAL
CONNECTIONS
Join the Growing Click.
Your message could be viewed more than 26,000 times a month in SIGNAL Connections. Rates start at $400 per issue. For information on banner advertising or sponsorships, contact Marsha Carpenter 703-631-6181. Limited number of spaces per issue.
AFCEA PORTAL
Click Here to renew membership, change records or take advantage of member-only AFCEA benefits, including the Virtual Boardroom, computer purchase programs and online courses.
|  |
|
|
Image Analysts Delve Into the Digital Realm
by Cheryl Lilie
In the next few months, the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, or NGA, will take a large step toward digitizing its hardcopy image analysis search and exploitation processes. The agency plans to integrate a commercial technology for the imagery analysis task of broad area search. In September, after a two-year-long development and procurement process, NGA will select a single softcopy search product from among three competing vendor teams. NGA expects to implement the capability into its National System for Geospatial Intelligence (NSGI) by mid to late 2005.
The softcopy program initially was designed to replicate the current hardcopy analysis functions to ease the transition to full softcopy imagery analysis. An NGA official comments that the greatest challenge to implementing the program was overcoming the human inertia that opposes change. The NGA personnel involved in the program believe that they have addressed this problem by following up on comments collected from experienced government imagery analysts during the evaluation of each of the prototypes. “The impact of the user’s input on our requirements and the positive response from our vendors to meet these requirements have brought us to the edge of a successful conclusion of this development process,” says Steve Haynes, an NGA program manager.
While the NGA’s first requirement was to ease into the transition by keeping the program process familiar to users, softcopy search also will provide image analysts with new capabilities. Analysts will have the ability to mosaic multiple images together in a virtual environment and perform smooth roam over the entire mosaic. Another feature, called the snail trail, will track where an analyst has searched by overlaying a translucent color box on an overview window. This capability will help analysts maintain spatial orientation during operation.
Although not as a part of the softcopy product search, the NGA tasked the National Technology Alliance with recommending display technologies for NGA monitors. The results of that effort, presented to the NGA in February 2004, showed that the latest in display technology would be required for integrating the softcopy program with the NSGI. The NGA decided to take advantage of display technologies when the softcopy capabilities are fielded in 2005, at which time the agency will select high-resolution display monitors that will be made standard to the integrated exploitation capability.
The need for a softcopy analysis program was identified in 2000 after a congressionally directed action required the NGA to compare hardcopy and softcopy image analysis. The agency determined that it needed to digitize its imagery analysis and exploitation processes but acknowledged that currently available commercial off-the-shelf products could not perform the tasks required in softcopy. In February 2002, the NGA released a broad agency announcement for a softcopy search development program and encouraged vendors to develop a capability into a single product.
Four development stages, or spirals, were designed to test vendor products against the requirements the NGA set for the softcopy program. With each spiral, the level of requirements and percentage of success increased. The first spiral was a proof-of-concept level of development. Each of the two successive spirals focused on basic softcopy search functionality. The fourth and final spiral, completed in June 2004, was designed to promote product stability, ease of use and ease of integration into the NSGI.
All three teams passed the four stages, but only one will be chosen for full procurement of the program this September. According to Haynes, the strongest team will be the one that provides the government with the best value solution. Evaluation and cost data as well as other discriminating criteria will be the basis for the NGA’s decision.
The goal of the softcopy image analysis program is to eliminate hardcopy production completely; however, the phase-out schedule remains classified. Long-term effects of going digital include needing fewer materials associated with hardcopy production and, over time, requiring fewer steps to obtain and evaluate an image.
An interview with Lt. Gen. James R. Clapper Jr., USAF (Ret.), the director of the NGA, is the cover story in the August issue of SIGNAL Magazine, in the mail to AFCEA members and subscribers on August 2, 2004. To obtain a copy, contact the AFCEA Service Center.
[PRINTER FRIENDLY VERSION]
|
|
| |
|
|
|
LETTERS
|
|
There are no letters for this article. To post your own letter, click Post Letter.
|
|
[POST LETTER]
|
|
|
|
