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Katy Appleton
University of East Anglia, UK

K.Appleton@uea.ac.uk

Katy is a postgraduate student at the University of East Anglia. Her research examines the usefulness of landscape visualization for environmental decision-making; more information can be found on her own web pages. She is also a graduate of 3D Nature Academy.
	Broads Authority Wetlands This project was initiated and funded by the Broads Authority. The Broads are a low-lying wetland area in eastern England, primarily within the county of Norfolk, and are a significant ecological site. The BA approached the University of East Anglia with a request to visualise the landscape impacts of the (hypothetical) creation of some ecological corridors - areas of farmland that would be allowed to revert to natural vegetation in order to provide a linkage between existing Sites of Special Scientific Interest (SSSIs). Tracts of arable and grassland were identified by the BA as likely to revert to habitats such as grassy heath, reedbed and species-rich fen, and two major roads in the study area were designated to be crossed by ecobridges - wide, tunnel-like bridges covered with natural vegetation. These areas were digitised and, along with land use and cover information from the Ordnance Survey and , aerial photography from Bluesky and elevation data from Intermap, formed the basis for these visualisations. The resulting images were presented to the Broads Research Advisory Panel in October 2006 and may form part of future public consultation and information events. It is to be stressed that the changes shown are currently completely hypothetical. Further work on a similar theme is being done by PhD student Paul Munday, and it is hoped that his work will appear here in due course.

	Climate Study -Baseline From a VNS2 point of view, the work was done using Search Queries and Scenarios. A separate set of land-use data was imported for each climate change state, then Scenarios were used to turn these vectors on and off. Each set of vectors had the same land-use attribute (identical attribute name, but different values in each scenario), which was used with Search Queries to apply the correct Ecosystem to each polygon. Some slightly different foliage effects and ecosystems were also set up for each situation, with changes made to the colouring of textures/foliage images to represent the effects of warming. Scenarios and Search Queries were invaluable in this project and enabled me to quickly set up and switch between the three situations, allowing more time to be spent on improving the details of the scenes. In the main field, the baseline crop is sugar beet; scenario B shows maize, and A is sunflowers. All buildings are represented with Walls. Credit to Adam Hauldren for the background wind turbine models (the small generator near the foreground house in B is an image). The VRML and NVE interactive models were produced very quickly in Scene Express, and we look forward to working with it much more in the future. This work was presented at GeoComputation 2003: http://www.geocomputation.org/2003/Abstracts/Lovett_Abs.pdf and is currently under review for full publication.

	Climate Study -Option A A is a world where nobody cares about climate change and nothing is really done to try and reduce impacts and fossil fuels continue to be widely used - water goes to domestic and business use with little left over for the countryside/irrigating crops - hence a dry, burnt-up looking world.

	Climate Study -Option B B is a world where everyone is doing their best to mitigate against climate change, so water conservation measures are in place, crops can be irrigated, and wind energy and other renewables reduce fossil fuel use.

	Humberhead Levels The the study area for these images is the Humberhead Levels, by the estuary of the River Humber in eastern England. "Search queries were invaluable, but the VNS 2 "scenarios" feature meant that I could leave the program rendering on its own without having to come back and change datasets to switch between 2002 and 2020 information. Time from receipt of data to handover of visualizations was just under 2 days." said Katy These images were presented at a Countryside Agency conference, Value in Wetness, in December 2002 at Doncaster: A. Lovett, T. Dockerty, A. Bone, G. Sünnenberg, K. Appleton (2002), Visualising the future - effects of policy and climate change on land use and landscape in the Humberhead Levels. Image 1 is the current land use (2001), viewpoint 1. Cereal (wheat, barley, oats) and ground crops (e.g. potatoes, carrots, sugar beet), little maize, some turf. Image 2 is the projected land use 2002, viewpoint 1. Less cereal, more maize, more root crops. Image 3 is the current land use (2001), viewpoint 2. Crops as before. Image 4 is the projected land use 2020, viewpoint 2. Crops as before.

	River Wissey This image is a viewpoint within the NALMI study area, and shows the River Wissey a few miles downstream from its source. It is used as the frontispiece in Katy's PhD thesis. It uses VNS2's capabilities for transparent water and volumetric clouds.

	Proposed Cycle Path These images are part of a set used to illustrate a proposed cycle and pedestrian path with two new bridges in Norwich, England. The path is intended to link the city with a nearby country park, and the images were used in public consultation by Norwich City Council. The first view shows the riverside portion of the path; the new bridge in the distance is in its open position with a traditional Norfolk Wherry shown passing through. The next two images show two possible bridge designs. Image 4 shows the cycle path at its crossing with a private road. The final view is of a second, smaller, fixed bridge over a river tributary on the edge of the country park. The images were also used to assess landscape and planning professionals' opinions of landscape visualisation; these findings are in press and should be published in Computers, Environment and Urban Systems in 2003.

	West Norfolk River Valley These images were created in co-operation with the Norfolk Arable Land Management Initiative (NALMI) and two landowners in the area of West Norfolk. Various schemes were being proposed in the upper valley of the River Wissey, both to open up public access and to control floodwater. The images were used at public meetings, and feedback on the usefulness of the images was also gained from meeting participants. The images show a new bridlepath and new lakes and reservoirs.