Aerial Photogrammetry: Janak Raj Joshi

Aerial Photogrammetry
Janak Raj Joshi

Aerial Photography
Central Projection
Orthogonal v/s Central Projection
Aerial Photographs: Central projection
Topo map: orthogonal projection
Map: orthogonal projection
• Shows terrain features at a fixed scale
(according to a map projection)
• Features are shown by conventional symbols
(line map)
• Contains a coordinate reference, scale
reference, names etc.
• The symbols are explained in a legend
Aerial Photograph: central projection
• Scale varies due to relief displacement and

tilt displacement
• Shows brightness, colors, shadows etc. of
terrain features
• No (precise) coordinate reference or scale
reference, no names etc.
• No legend (as there are no symbols !)
• The user has to interpret the image
Auxiliary data on aerial Photographs
Vertical and oblique photographs
Vertical and oblique photographs
• Vertical Photo
– True vertical: Camera axis coincides with plumb line, camera
tilt is zero degree
– Near vertical: Camera axis does not exactly coincide with
plumb line, it is nearly vertical, an unintentional tilt of camera
axis up to 3 degrees can be acceptable
• Oblique Photo
– Low oblique: camera axis is tilted intentionally to acquire more
ground coverage, horizon is not visible in photograph
– High oblique: camera axis is sufficiently tilted intentionally to
acquire more ground coverage, horizon is visible in photograph
Scale of aerial photograph
• Scale of an aerial photograph can be defined
as:
– The ratio of the distance between any two points in
an aerial photograph to the corresponding distance
on the ground
• Scale of an aerial photograph depends on

– Flying height of the aircraft above ground object
– Focal length of the camera used
Height, Elevation and Altitude
• Height: often used as synonym for elevation or rather
used as: height of a building (above the ground), flying
height of a survey aircraft (above ground level), etc.
• Elevation: height of the ground surface, specifically
when determined with respect to the geoid (mean sea
level) or the ellipsoid of the spatial reference system.
• Altitude: vertical distance of an object above a
reference surface, usually the geoid (mean sea level),
eg, altitude of an aircraft
Scale of a vertical photo
Scale of a vertical photo
Scale and ground coverage
• Larger the scale: smaller the ground coverage
• Larger the scale: larger the object size on
photograph, easy to recognize the details
• Smaller the scale: larger the ground coverage

• Smaller the scale: smaller the object size on
photograph, difficult to recognize the details
Effect of focal length on scale
Effect of focal length on ground coverage
Inter-dependency: S, H and f
• For a constant flying height:
– Larger the focal length:
• Larger the scale of photo
• Smaller the ground (angular) coverage
– Smaller the focal length:
• smaller the scale of photo
• Larger the ground (angular) coverage
Inter-dependency: S, H and f
• For a constant focal length
– Higher the altitude of aircraft
• Smaller the scale of photo
• Larger the ground coverage
– Lower the altitude of aircraft
• Larger the scale of photo
• Smaller the ground coverage
Effect of terrain/object height on scale
Scale of an oblique photo
Exercise
• Find the scale of the photograph taken from an aircraft flying
2000 m above the MSL with a camera of focal length 150 mm,
note that the terrain height is 500 m from MSL.
• If the scale of an aerial photograph, taken by a camera of focal
length 200 mm, is 1: 20000 find the flying height of the aircraft.
• If the scale of an aerial photograph, taken by a camera
mounted on an aircraft flying 5000m above the ground, is 1:
25000, find the focal length of the camera.
• Elevation of Achham district varies from 340m to 3400m from
MSL. If we carry out a aerial flight over Achham district by an
aircraft at an constant elevation of 5000m from MSL with a
camera of 152 mm focal length, what would be the maximum
and minimum scale of the photographs?
Relief Displacement
• Relief displacement is the shift or
displacement in the photographic position of
an image caused by the relief (elevation above
or below a selected datum) of the object
• With respect to the datum, the displacement
is outward for the points whose elevation are
above and inward for the points whose
elevation are below the datum
Relief displacement
• The displacements caused by elevation
differences are as irregular as terrain relief;
• If there are no protruding objects we cannot
see the relief displacement
• Moreover, the relief displacement depends on
the location within the image (r);
Exercise
• What would be the relief displacement of a
building of 50 m height on a aerial photograph
taken from 3000 m above the ground surface at a
radial distance of 10 cm from principal point .Find
out the corresponding relief displacement on the
ground if the photograph was taken with a camera
of 150 mm focal length. What would be the
maximum relief displacement on a photograph if
the format of the photograph is 23 cm*23 cm

Aerial Photogrammetry: Janak Raj Joshi

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Aerial Photogrammetry

Janak Raj Joshi

• Scale varies due to relief displacement and

• Scale of an aerial photograph depends on

• Smaller the scale: larger the ground coverage

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