JAUE2017-054: Urban Forest Vegetation Information Extraction Based on Digital Photography System

Abstract

Urban forest vegetation information, for assessing urban ecosystem services such as carbon sink or cooling, is
missing for most cities. New data and methods for calculating vegetation characteristics including UAV
techniques offer large benefits for addressing this lack of information. This paper describes an unprecedented
experiment using high-resolution true color images and near infrared images taken by an unmanned aerial vehicle
(UAV) for the purpose of extraction techniques research with high precision for urban forest vegetation
information in AnShun city, belonging to GuiZhou karst mountainous area, China. By using digital
photogrammetry system combined with 3S (GPS, RS, GIS), the land utilization and the tree information(i.e., tree
species, number, height, crown diameter, volume etc.), were obtained from the analyses. In comparison to field
survey data we reached high accuracies concerning the derivation of forest vegetation information(i.e., tree
species 85.75%, tree species number 87.7%, height 91%, crown diameter 77%, volume 68%). To conclude, it is
effective using the extraction techniques provided in this study, which provides some suggestions for the future
urban forest vegetation information extraction.