  Movements in imagery captivate the human eye and imagination. They are also
of interest in variety of scientific disciplines that study spatiotemporal
dynamics. Popular methods for quantifying movement in imagery include particle
image velocimetry and digital image correlation. Both methods are widely
applied in engineering and materials science, but less applied in other
disciplines. This paper describes an implementation of a basic digital image
correlation algorithm in R open source software as well as an extension
designed to quantify persistent movement velocities in sequences of three or
more images. Algorithms are applied in the novel arena of landscape ecology to
quantify population movement and to produce vector fields for easy
visualization of complex movement patterns across space. Functions to
facilitate analyses are available in the ICvectorfields software package. These
methods and functions are likely to produce novel insights in theoretical and
landscape ecology because they facilitate visualization and comparison of
theoretical and observed data in complex and heterogeneous environments.
