Semi-automated penguin counting from digital aerial photogra
Details of Research
TitleSemi-automated penguin counting from digital aerial photographsAbstractSemi-automated software has been written in Matlab to enable nesting Adélie penguins (Pygoscelis adeliae), on aerial photographs of the Ross Sea sector of Antarctica, to be counted. Previously, this task had been accomplished by manual marking of printed images; this is slow, and highly-dependent on the skill of the operator. The basis of the semiautomated counting procedure is to use linear discriminant analysis to separate the background (snow, water, rock, bare ground) from the guano-covered colony area, followed by morphological image processing operators to select the breeding penguins. Many interactive features are provided that allow an operator to delete penguins singly or in groups, selectively process a defined area, and record the running census counts. Copyright 2011 IEEE.AcknowledgementsWe acknowledgement support for funding and logistics from Antarctica New Zealand, from Squadron 40 of the Royal New Zealand Air Force (RNZAF), and Helicopters New Zealand and pilot Rob McPhail.
TypeConferenceCitationMcNeill, S., Barton, K., Lyver, P. and Pairman, D. (2011). Semi-automated penguin counting from digital aerial photographs. International Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium (IGARSS), 6050185: 4312-4315 doi:10.1109/IGARSS.2011.6050185 IdentifierMcNeill2011Relevancerank5
Pairman, D., Semi-automated penguin counting from digital aerial photogra , [McNeill2011]. Antarctica NZ, accessed 20/04/2026, https://adam.antarcticanz.govt.nz/nodes/view/63668, 10.1109/IGARSS.2011.6050185
