SPLINE MODEL OF GRIDDED DATA OPERATION AS A PRINCIPLE OF ELECTRONIC MAPPING SEABED TOPOGRAPHY

Abstract

The influence of technologies of automated processing of hydrographic survey results on the potential of the human factor in the transformation of polygraphic cartographic products into digital ones is analyzed. When configuring the digital bathymetric model, the concept of the navigation surface is used as a perspective principle of automated mapping. The approach to the problem of generating bathymetric contours from measurement results in the navigation surface paradigm is construed on continuous spline interpolation of geospatial data for reasonable cartographic generalization when creating electronic cartographic products. From the theoretical positions of the spline approach, the subjectivity of the method of artificial displacement of generalized isobaths to deep-water areas is excluded when creating a safe digital model of the bottom relief, interpreted in a mathematical sense as a navigational isosurface. The principle of electronic mapping based on the use of a spline in tension as an effective approach for the process of generalizing isobaths in order to obtain a wide range of morphometric characteristics of underwater topography has been developed. The generalized line of the active depth contour is estimated in the form of algorithmic reproduction on electronic charts of the safe convexity of the isobate towards the deep-sea area due to the practical implementation of the B-spline “snake model” by analogy with the serpentine configuration of the bathymetric isoline in the form of a piecewise polynomial function. When using the spline approach, an innovative principle of electronic mapping of the underwater landscape based on operating with a set of gridded data is implemented. The latter are interpreted as the results of depth measurements with the formalization of a two-dimensional frame of fixed values of bathymetric measurements for their representation as a navigational isosurface in three-dimensional Euclidean space. The actual synthesis of the seabed topography is implemented on the basis of a proven hybrid spline model for a specific indicative test case based on the processing of experimental gridded data. Hypothetically, the possibility of intellectual assistance to the watch officer in the strategy of instant orientation in conditions of a minimum depth reserve under the keel is organized when using computer three-dimensional visualization of the topography of the underwater relief in an unaffiliated graphic environment with foreign software.