Landform Analysis using elevation and hydrography
Geographic representations of fluvial systems (hydrography) and digital elevation can be combined using GIS methods to create derived datasets that represent fluvial processes in 2-D and 3-D, including stream profiles. These derived datasets can provide information about erosion potential, fluvial processes, and landform history, including clues to tectonic events (e.g. geological uplift and subsidence).

GIS for Landscape Characterization
Geographic Information Systems (GIS) technology traces its origins to the 1960s, but the field truly matured with the development of inexpensive computer graphics hardware and scalable relational database systems that allow the processing of millions of data records accessed via client-server databases, or even as services in the cloud. GIS can be used to rapidly develop measurements of landscape variables (for example, land cover type, slope, elevation) needed for both process-based and statistical models describing hydrology and water quality.