High-Resolution Orthorectified Imagery from 1953, Niwot Ridge LTER Project Area, Colorado

Manley, W.F., Parrish, E.G., and Lestak, L.R., 2009,
High-Resolution Orthorectified Imagery and Digital Elevation Models for Study of
Environmental Change at Niwot Ridge and Green Lakes Valley, Colorado: Niwot
Ridge LTER, INSTAAR, University of Colorado at Boulder, digital media. This image is a mosaic of orthorectified aerial photography from 1953 for the
Niwot Ridge Long Term Ecological Research (LTER) project area at 0.7 m resolution.
The image also covers the Green Lakes Valley portion of the Boulder Creek Critical
Zone Observatory (CZO). The mosaic has the qualities of a photograph and the
functionality of a map layer for use in Geographic Information Systems (GIS) or
remote sensing software. The mosaic is derived from approx. 1:45,000 scale, black
and white (grayscale) photographs acquired by the United States Geological Survery
(USGS). The aerial photos were obtained as 1800 dpi digital scans from the USGS EROS
Data Center (EDC) and then fully orthorectified in a Leica Photogrammetry Suite
(LPS) bundle blockfile using an air-photo camera model, a Digital Elevation Model
(DEM), known focal length, and hand-measured fiducial coordinates. Individual photo
frames were mosaiced with cutlines and clipped to the Niwot project extent area. The
photography was registered to 2008 orthocorrected Denver Region Council of
Governments (DRCOG) aerial photography. Horizontal accuracy is 1.5 m (RMSE, relative
to the 2008 reference imagery, based on 9 independent check points). The mosaic
covers an area of 98 km2 and is available in GeoTIFF format, in a UTM zone 13
projection and NAD83 horizontal datum, with FGDC-compliant metadata. The mosaic is
available through an unrestricted public license, and can be obtained by request
(see Distributor contact information below). Other datasets available in this series
includes orthorectified aerial photograph mosaics (for 1972, 1985, 1990, 1999, 2000,
2002, 2004, 2006 and 2008), digital elevation models (DEM's), and accessory map
layers. Together, the DEM's and imagery will be of interest to students, research
scientists, and others for observation and analysis of natural features and
ecosystems. NOTE: This EML metadata file does not contain important geospatial data processing
information. Before using any NWT LTER geospatial data read the arcgis metadata XML
file in either ISO or FGDC compliant format, using ArcGIS software (ArcCatalog >
description), or by viewing the .xml file provided with the geospatial
dataset.