Photographic, mapping, printing, & publication services

A. DIGITAL RESOURCE ACQUISITIONThe U.S. Department of Agriculture, Farm Service Agency (FSA), Aerial Photography Field Office (APFO), in preparation and planning for an apparent transition from aerial film to direct digital acquisition for natural resource aerial photography projects, is requesting information related to price factors. The hypothetical project proposed in this RFI, in the geographic area listed in Paragraph C, is for planning purposes only. This request for information is strictly an exercise for planning and pricing purposes only that will NOT result in any contract. The Government is requesting this information to gain a better understanding of costs associated with digital acquisition and be able to prepare more accurate price estimates so that future digital acquisition will be adequately planned for and funded.



B. BACKGROUND

APFO is responsible for contracting and administering USDA "Resource Projects," including those for the U.S. Forest Service and other government agencies. Historically, resource photography has been strictly aerial film acquisition in stereo triplets and when needed, scanned and then orthorectified. Resource imagery is typically used for such things as vegetation mapping, resource inventory, land use management and planning, fire assessment, etc. Characteristically resource projects are forested areas with high elevation and steep terrain. The area size of past projects have ranged from 50 to 6,000 square miles.



Customer requirements appear to be steering the direction of the aerial photography industry to direct digital acquisition, therefore the Government must be prepared for and respond to this transition. In preparation, and in order to maintain a high level of service to our customers, the Government seeks information and feedback. Such feedback and information serves to foster our relationship with our contractors and customers.



C. REQUEST FOR INFORMATION

The Government is soliciting responses from industry, academia, and the public regarding costs associated with direct digital acquisition of "Resource" (U.S. Forest Service) type aerial photography projects. Please respond to the questions listed below by using the following project parameters and ground rules:



Project Parameters: Bridger-Teton National Forest, Wyoming, 5,374 sq miles (see attached shapefile). Acquisition Requirements: Leaf-on, June - August flying season, 45 degrees minimum sun angle. Image Product: 4-band, 8-bit TIFFs (or GeoTIFFs), with FGDC compliant metadata.



Please note the Bridger Teton National Forest project is a hypothetical project for planning purpose only and was chosen as a representative resource project. Resource projects in the western U.S. are typically in very mountainous areas with extreme terrain relief and in order to provide accurate price information for this fictional project, some preliminary flight planning may be required. The U.S. Government does not expect to award this project as an actual contract.



Stereo Coverage:



Question 1: What is the price (per square mile) for 12-in GSD stereo coverage? What assumptions were made that could impact price (i.e. side/overlap)?



Question 2: What is an approximate increase/decrease in price if GSD requirement was changed to 6-in or 2-ft? An approximate price factor is all that is needed.



Question 3: Describe how you would be performing quality control on the digital product (i.e. how would you be inspecting the side/overlap)?



Question 4: What file format (i.e. GeoTIFF, TIFF with world file, etc.) and geo-referencing (i.e. single point, etc) is your cost estimate based on? Would you consider this a standard product for your current customers?



Upgrade to Ortho:



Question 5: What would the approximate price increase be if an ortho product was also required? What horizontal accuracy is this price estimate based on and what assumptions (i.e. tile size) did you make that could significantly impact the price estimate if changed? What elevation model would be used and how many ground control points would be needed?



Question 6: What data and in what format (i.e., post-processed ABGPS/IMU data) does the Government need delivered if the ortho product has been delayed or will be prepared by a third party? An example would be if a regional forest office does not have enough money to buy an ortho product but wants the option to issue a secondary contract during the following fiscal year to have ortho products generated.



Additional Questions:



Question 7: What would the price impact be if raw imagery (non-geoprocessed, uncompressed digital image files in a TIFF format) was a required deliverable?



Question 8: What impact to the Small Business Administration (SBA) small business size standards would moving to direct digital acquisition have on the aerial photography community?



D. INSTRUCTIONS TO RESPONDENTS

Responses to this RFI are due no later than 4:30 P.M. (Mountain Time) on March 14, 2008. Two copies of your response may be mailed to the Contracting Officer, Mr. Geoffrey Gabbott at 2222 West 2300 South, Salt Lake City, UT 84119, faxed to (801) 956-3640 to the attention of Mr. Geoffrey Gabbott, or one copy submitted electronically to apfo.contracts@slc.usda.gov. The electronic copy of your responses must be in an Adobe Systems PDF (Portable Document Format) format and readable by the Adobe Acrobat Reader. Any proprietary data that is included in the response must be marked appropriately at the paragraph level (page level is acceptable for full page table, graphs, etc). Any response marked proprietary at the document level will not be considered.



E. CONTACT INFORMATION

Clarifications or questions regarding this RFI must be submitted in writing to john.mootz@slc.usda.gov or charlotte.vanderbilt@slc.usda.gov or faxed to (801) 956-3640 to their attention. All clarifications or questions must reference this RFI.



NOTE: This RFI is being issued solely for information and planning purposes and does not constitute an Invitation for Bids (IFB), a Request for Proposal (RFP), a Request for Quotations (RFQ) or an indication that the Government will contract for any of the items and/or services contained in this notice. All information received in response to this notice that is marked proprietary will be handled accordingly. Responses to this notice will not be returned. In submitting a response, you are solely responsible and accountable for all of the expenses associated with your response. The following provision is applicable to this notice and is hereby incorporated by reference: FAR 52.215-3 Request for Information or Solicitation for Planning Purposes (Oct 1997). The full text of this clause is available at: http://www.acquisition.gov/far/index.html.