Photography is a valuable tool for monitoring extensive landscapes. With recent advances in digital camera technology and computer hardware/software, ground-level (staff mounted) photography is easier to collect, store, transfer, and share than ever before. The challenge in using this technology is the time spent determining photo locations and subsequent geo-referencing so images can be used for statistical and spatial analysis. The objective of our project was to develop an on-the-go image acquisition system that permits geo-referenced images to be taken from an ATV mounted camera. The system consists of a: 1) digital camera pointed vertically downward from a platform mounted on the ATV, 2) GPS logger recording time, position, and bearing at 1Hz, 3) image positioning software that automatically geo-positions images based upon the time the photo was taken and the GPS tracklog. Our system also scales the image based upon lens characteristics and the height of the camera above the ground. Output from the program is a series of geographically registered images with associated KML files and projection files that can be imported into GIS programs. The KML file provides coordinate and scale information and the projection file specifies the geographic projection and datum used.  Our algorithm can be used to batch process files leading to extremely fast geo-referencing of high resolution photos which were generally accurate to within 5 meters of true location when tested in Oregon. The ease and speed of our image positioning system renders landscape scale photo-monitoring much more cost and time efficient.
Oral presentation and poster titles, abstracts, and authors from the Society for Range Management (SRM) Annual Meetings and Tradeshows, from 2013 forward.