Ten police officers from around the state are participating in a photogrammetry class that enables them to save time at crime and accident scenes. Warsaw Police Dept. Public Information Officer Kip Shuter and Tom Merkling of the Indiana State Police Fort Wayne Post are teaching the 40-hour course. In the class, officers learn how to use a camera and shoot in manual mode. They also are learning the iWitness Close Range Photogrammetry program, which works with the photos and becomes a measuring tool. This is the third class that has been taught in the last two years. Shuter said this method saves time at the scene and allows roads to be reopened much quicker when used at accidents. Indiana has been using this program since 2007, and WPD has been using it for four years. “Everyone likes it because of the time-saving factor,” Shuter said. “Officers can spend more time in the safety of their office than on the road, and once captured in photos, you have the image forever.” Officers participating in the class this week are from South Bend, Mishawaka, Fort Wayne, Indiana State Police, Delaware County, Lafayette and West Lafayette. Shuter said in a normal crime or accident scene, an officer can “get away with a minimum of 20 photos.” After markers are set in place and the photos are taken, the iWitness program takes over. It allows the officers to link photos together by matching the center dots from the markers in the photos to the corresponding markers. The program then creates a 3-D visual of the scene. Different brands of cameras can be used, and Merkling said they are still “getting through the quirks.” Officers also can shoot photographs from above the scene and photograph a single marker for more detail because cameras are meant to be set at a certain lens length. Merkling said as part of the time initiative in Indiana, officers are trying to quicken clearance of the roadways from crashes. “What we found doing studies on our own processes of this doing this, we found we’re clearing scenes a lot quicker,” Merkling said. “It opens the roadways a lot quicker and makes roadways safer.”
