In 2011 AAM Pty Ltd was commissioned by the Commonwealth to obtain orthophotography of the Cocos (Keeling) Islands. Between the 8th and 16th of August 2011 orthophotography was obtained for the entire extent of the islands (including North Keeling Island) by AAM Pty Ltd using a fixed-wing light aircraft. Previously, aerial photography was captured for Cocos (Keeling) Islands in 1987 and satellite imagery in 2004. The 2011 imagery has a 15cm on ground pixel size resolution, an improvement on all previous imagery.
Using an automated process, raw images were joined to form two mosaics, one of the Cocos southern lagoon and one of North Keeling Island. Colour balancing and replacement of certain areas with alternate raw images was performed for consistency. As a guide, the orthophotography is horizontally accurate to 30cm.
The orthophotography was provided to Geoscience Australia in UTM WGS 47S. All imagery was captured using a DiMAC UltraLight 50mm Lens camera within approximately 2 hours of low tide. During this period tides ranged from 0.4m to 1.3m. Flying height was around 800 meters with flight line spacing of around half a kilometre. The clarity and resolution is an improvement on the 2006 satellite imagery.
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