Brief Communication: Low-cost, on-demand aerial photogrammetry for glaciological measurement

Remotely sensed glaciological measurements can be expensive, often involving a trade-off between resolution, scale, and frequency. We report on a case study in which two low-cost techniques were used to generate digital elevation models and orthomosaics of an Arctic glacier in consecutive ablation s...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:The Cryosphere
Main Authors: Whitehead, K., Moorman, B. J., Hugenholtz, C. H.
Format: Text
Language:English
Published: 2018
Subjects:
Online Access:https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-7-1879-2013
https://tc.copernicus.org/articles/7/1879/2013/
Description
Summary:Remotely sensed glaciological measurements can be expensive, often involving a trade-off between resolution, scale, and frequency. We report on a case study in which two low-cost techniques were used to generate digital elevation models and orthomosaics of an Arctic glacier in consecutive ablation seasons. In the first aerial survey we used an unmanned aerial vehicle and acquired images autonomously. The following year we took advantage of the helicopter used for site access, and were able to acquire images manually, for little additional helicopter time. We present a preliminary assessment of accuracy and apply these data to measure glacier thinning and motion.