Orthophoto: the image you can measure on

An orthophoto is an aerial image that has been rectified: perspective and terrain distortions are removed. The result is an image you can measure distances on, like a plan.

Assembled from many photos, it is called an orthomosaic.

What separates it from an aerial photo

An ordinary photo is taken from one point. Anything not directly beneath the lens is seen at an angle: a building leans outward, a pylon lies down, a distance measured at the edge of the frame is wrong.

An orthophoto corrects that. Every pixel is brought back to the vertical, as if the camera had been directly above that exact point. Scale becomes constant across the whole image.

⚠️ "Rectified" does not mean "georeferenced". An orthophoto can be perfectly measurable internally and badly positioned on a map — which is what happens without ground control points.

What it is used for

• overlaying a project, a cadastre or a network onto the actual ground;
• measuring areas and distances without travelling;
• comparing two dates — site progress, erosion, stockpile change;
• documenting damage or a works handover.

What Waypoint360 does, and what it does not

We do not produce orthophotos. Stitching and rectification belong to dedicated photogrammetry software.

What we cover: the flight preparation that makes it possible — zones, compliance, declarations — and the logbook that records it.

On the client side, the directory lets you find an operator who declares survey and mapping among their activities.

Going further

• Photogrammetry — the process that builds it.
• GSD — what decides how fine it is.