Seoul (capital city of South Korea), following successful utilization of 3D technology in its development of Urban Planning Information System, is taking notice from related industries. With various 3D map services already available from major internet portals like Google and MS, it's another indication of the 3D technology being used by professionals in critical decision makings.

The key features of 3D Geographic Information System (GIS) engine include High performance real-time 3D rendering, data quality for gaining a sense of location and place, comprehensive search with location editing capability , handling level of detail for seamless operation (re-centering, zoom in or out), and modeling landmarks such as buildings, bridges, historical sites, landscapes, street legends and other objects.

Seoul Metropolitan government used high quality 3D Geospatial database developed from a 1 meter digital terrain model , texturing 10cm aerial imagery covering 605 square kilometers(1567 square mile), about one million box-shape simple model for general buildings and 1200 accurate model by using actual picture of the major landmarks.

The project designed with these technologies having resource of High-Def images and extensive database that can be utilized for urban planning in real-time by Urban Planning Committee was highly praised over the other competing products; the Google Earth, TerraExplorer (Skyline Software System) and 3D City (GeoSim systems)

Pic.1 Surrounding City views from high above Seoul.

Pic.2 & 3 Eye level view of local bank and National Tax Service building in Jong-Ro county using horizontal (left) and upward (right) perspective.

3D helped erecting global city environment
Envisioning creating a clean, attractive urban environment as world class global city, the Seoul metropolitan government launched the Urban Planning Information System (UPIS) project. Its initial four phase plan began with $60mil from 1999 to 2002 and second-two phase plan from 2005 to present which ran up additional $10 mil. The current two phase UPIS plan includes integration of infrastructure management system and 3D Virtual landscape system upgrade for the entire Seoul.

Inguen Lee, director of the urban planning bureau, "We had a daunting task of meeting the two major issues; one is constructing tall buildings and the other is managing scenic views of natural resource. Seoul with its high density 12 million residents (quarter of total national population) coexist in natural environments with rivers and its surrounding mountains. To meet these needs properly, it is necessary for us to make use of 3D technology to get a better understanding of development impact for example, simulation of city skyline in various view points and evaluation of topographic feature change which was not possible in the past." explained reason for using 3D technology.

Seoul plans to benefit from using the system to promote participation to city plans by providing 12 million city residents public web access and in turn boost tourism sector to bring in more foreign visitors. And to reach that goal, new parks will be put into places to aid tourism operations and boost tourism.

Pic.4 From high above central Seoul: using urban planning site plan image to view city landscape and run actual ground decisions simultaneously while viewing.		Pic.5 Identical view of Pic.4 above: rendering of specific building models only, able to view with or without particular object in the screen.

Pic.6 Rendering of 3D image of South River Bridge from North of Han River. You can see the entire skyline of Kangnam.		Pic. 7 Aerial view of Duksoo Royal Palace in Seoul.

"We will also support advanced 3D engine technology in open source environment in 2008. Our future goals are to be the premier global leader as an optimized 3D virtual world solution provider in the areas of application development and system integration. For example, introduce Avatar (3D Virtual World) with web 2.0 technology that can run and analyze and communicate with users. We will also apply ubiquitous technology into 3D platform to bring more efficient city management tool." said, President Kyungmin Kim, Woodai Cals Ltd. which developed the system technology for the Seoul project.

Currently Woodai Cal gives 3D engine tech support to related GIS businesses in Germany, Netherlands, Hong Kong, and Japan both in government and private enterprises.

Meantime, addition to the urban planning system, City of Seoul is providing civil service (open system), traffic information, Land Information Service, and GIS Portal service to the residents.

3D giving new business opportunities to web 2.0
The 3D technology with GIS information not only helped the City of Seoul but grafting it into internet has created new business opportunities for web 2.0.

Adaptation of the 3D technology by internet service companies is flourishing more than ever. For example, 3D satellite image location search service now also provides things like online restaurant reservation, real time live traffic info service, which are allowing new advertisement markets.

Other areas of prospective opportunities among many include real-estate service with satellite images, 3D imagery modeling on the buildings and pictures, e-commerce linked to 3D map, virtual 3D website like Second life.