PROSPECT

What is it? Projects Panorama Orthographic Photo-montage Analysis Download
Prospect can be used to create both "static" and "temporal" projects. A static project shows the state of the woodland at one fixed moment. A temporal project is defined by a series of events, such as planting and felling, so that the state of the woodland can be displayed for any year throughout the sequence of events.

The map is used to edit the sub-compartments and locate viewpoints.


 

Static projects

To create a static project you need to supply the species, and optionally the height and tree spacing, or density, for each sub-compartment. This is a simple and fast way to generate views that represent a snapshot of a woodland in a given static state.

Temporal project

A "temporal" project is one in which in which the woodland can be seen to evolve over time. If you import a Shape file which includes an attribute field for the planting year then you can rapidly generate a series of images for different future years. Prospect includes its own growth models so that for each species an appropriate height will be displayed for a given age. Similarly, Prospect uses a default thinning model so that mature woodlands will be displayed with a lower density than new plantations.

The Shape files that you use can either be a single file describing a set of polygons that live through a series of events (e.g. felling, restocking) or else you can use the "Forester Web" system (as used by Forest and Land Scotland, and Forestry England) in which a pre-defined group of shape files are used for sub-compartments, components, coupes, and restocking. If you use this latter model then Prospect can rapidly merge the files to generate a series of maps and 3D visualizations showing the state of the woodlands at the years you specify.

When a map for a given year is generated the program also produces a breakdown of the percentages of different species and of the spread of different ages of the stands.

Prospect uses standard GIS "Shape" files of woodland compartments combined with free Ordnance Survey digital terrain data. You can also use commercial higher definition terrain data. The 3D surface can be draped with imagery, such as aerial photographs, Open Street Map, Ordnance Survey OpenMap, raster map tiles, Web Map Server (WMS), or Web Map Tile Server (WMTS) images.

Optionally you can include the woodlands in the Forestry Commission's National Forest Inventory to create the context for your woodland proposal. Similarly, the Forestry Commission's forest roads can be shown. Both these datasets are available for free from the Forestry Commission web site and can be included without any editing or processing.

You do not need to start with a shape file, you can just start drawing and editing your own sub-compartments. Or you can edit or delete imported sub-compartments.

Alongside the woodlands you can add layers for windfarms, powerlines, deer fencing, and solar farms.



This page last updated: Sun Dec 15 2024