Overview: Orthophotography Data
Summary of Orthophotography Data Products
Summary of Orthophotograpy Storage Specifications
Orthophotography Data Products
The King County Spatial Data Warehouse (KCGIS SDW) stores orthophotography and satellite imagery of multiple vintages, resolutions, and extents. Data is available in natural color, panchromatic (B&W) and multispectral formats, though not all versions are available for each dataset. Please refer to the descriptions below, and metadata where available, for more information about each dataset.
Not all data is available for release to the public or agencies and cities outside of King County government due to licensing agreements. Data may be made available, with restrictions, to consultants and other parties operating under contract or other formal agreement with King County. Availability of data to other outside parties is included in the summary below.
| Orthophoto Dataset | Vintage | Details of Data | Licensing and Access Restrictions | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Specifications | Data Extent | Comments | Can be obtained from King County | How it can be obtained | ||
| Western King County | 1936 | 1-band, panchromatic, 8-bit,1-ft pixel | Project area: Western King County, Vashon Island | Leaf-on data | Yes, but with some Distribution restrictions. See metadata. | Contact us for a custom data request. |
| City of Seattle | 1993 | 1-band, panchromatic, 8-bit,1-ft pixel | Project area: Seattle City limit area | Leaf-off data | No | Contact source directly. |
| NIES | 1996 | 3-band, natural color, 8-bit,3.28-ft pixel | Project area: Western King County, I-90 urban corridor, southern Snohomish Cty | Leaf-on data | Yes | Contact us for a custom data request. |
| WA Dept of Natural Resources | 1998 | 1-band, panchromatic, 8-bit,3-ft pixel | Project area : Entire King County, southern Snohomish County | Leaf-on data | No | Contact source directly. |
| DAIS | 2000 | 3-band, color infrared, 8-bit,1.64-ft pixel | Project area: Vashon Island | Leaf-on data, derived from 4-band multispectral data | No | Contact source directly. |
| 3-band, natural color, 8-bit,1.64-ft pixel | Project area: Vashon Island | Leaf-on data, derived from 4-band multispectral data | ||||
| Emerge | 2000 | 3-band, color infrared, 8-bit,2-ft pixel | Project area: Western King County, southwestern Snohomish Cty | Leaf-on data | Yes | Contact us for a custom data request. |
| 3-band, natural color, 8-bit,2-ft pixel | Project area: Western King County, southwestern Snohomish Cty | Leaf-on data, no blue band available for natural color creation, contains Vashon Island portions | ||||
| Ikonos | 2000 | 3-band, natural color, 8-bit,15-ft pixel | Project area: Eastern King County rural areas | Leaf-on data, satellite acquisition | No | Contact source directly. |
| Space Imaging natural color composite | 2000 | 3-band, natural color, 8-bit,4-ft pixel | Project area: Entire King County, southwestern Snohomish County | Leaf-on data, resampled composite of three Space Imaging data projects | No | Contact source directly. |
| King County | 2002 | 3-band, natural color, 8-bit,1-ft pixel | Project area: Entire King County, southwestern Snohomish Cty, extent limited to lidar acquistion | Leaf-on data, two acquisition resolutions resampled to 1-ft, rectified to lidar-derived terrain model | Yes | Contact us for a custom data request. |
| USGS Urban High-Resolution | 2002 | 3-band, natural color, 8-bit,0.98-ft pixel | Project area: Western King County/ southern Snohomish County urban area, does not include all I-90 urban corridor | Leaf-on data , rectified to USGS DEM, actual pixel size 1-ft | Yes | Contact us for a custom data request. |
| City of Seattle | 2005 | 3-band, natural color, 8-bit,0.5-ft pixel | Project area: City limits of Seattle | Early leaf-on data | No | Contact source directly. |
| Western King County (Aerials Express) | 2005 | 3-band, natural color, 8-bit,1-ft pixel | Project area: Western, urbanized, King County and SW Snohomish County | Leaf-on data | No | Contact source directly. |
| Pictometry Oblique and Vertical imagery - Western King County | 2005 | not tiled | not tiled | not tiled | No | Oblique and vertical imagery (2005-2006) is bundled with required ArcGIS extension and standalone desktop software. Available to licensed project participants only (Cities and other public service entities in King County). No tiled orthoimagery is available for this data set. Contact the King County GIS Data Coordinator for additional information. |
| King County - 0.5 and 1-foot (Pictometry) tiled orthoimagery | 2007 | 3-band, natural color, 8-bit,0.5-ft pixel in west KC and 1-ft pixel in east KC | Project area: King County and SW Snohomish County |
Leaf-on data | No | Orthoimagery is not available for distribution to the general public. At this time it is available solely to licensed project participants (Cities and other public service entities in King County). Licensed package includes orthoimagery tiles. Contact King County GIS Data Coordinator for additional information. |
| Pictometry Oblique and Vertical imagery - King County and southwestern Snohomish County | 2007 | not tiled | not tiled | not tiled | No | Oblique and vertical imagery (2007) is bundled with required ArcGIS extension and standalone desktop software. Available to licensed project participants only (Cities and other public service entities in King County). Orthoimagery tiles are included. Contact King County GIS Data Coordinator for additional information. |
King County - 0.5 and 1-foot (Pictometry) tiled orthoimagery |
2009 | 3-band, natural color, 8-bit,0.5-ft pixel in west KC and 1-ft pixel in east KC | Project area: King County and SW Snohomish County |
Leaf-on data | No | Orthoimagery is not available for distribution to the general public. At this time it is available solely to licensed project participants (Cities and other public service entities in King County). Licensed package includes orthoimagery tiles. Contact King County GIS Data Coordinator for additional information. |
Pictometry Oblique and Vertical imagery - King County and southwestern Snohomish County |
2009 | not tiled | not tiled | not tiled | No | Oblique and vertical imagery (2009) is bundled with required ArcGIS extension and standalone desktop software. Available to licensed project participants only (Cities and other public service entities in King County). Orthoimagery tiles are included. Contact King County GIS Data Coordinator for additional information. |
| Landsat and TM Satellite Imagery | Various vintages | not tiled | not tiled | not tiled | Yes | Contact us for a custom data request. |
| USGS Digital Topographic Quadrangle Graphics (DRG) | Various quadrangle dates | not tiled | not tiled | not tiled | Yes | Contact us for a custom data request. |
For data that King County can release, we can assist you in selecting the correct data and format for your needs, and in providing a cost-estimate for data preparation and media delivery. All imagery requests require submission of the CustomData Request form, in order for staff to properly estimate the effort needed to provide the data. The GIS Center can also assist you in contacting the original source or vendor for data that we cannot redistribute.
Image data sets are available in different formats, resolutions and tiling schemes. Depending on your business needs, you may wish to use data in either its native format (usually at the lowest 7500-ft tiling level) or at the township-range tiling level where the data has stored in a compressed image format, but still retains nearly full resolution. Larger mosaics at the zone tiling level are also available, plus each dataset is stored as a single tile in the keyregion directory. These latter files are more strongly compressed so lose some of their image quality but are useful when easy access to the the regional picture is important.
