Education and training resources on digital photogrammetry

Current close-range photogrammetry makes it possible to obtain 3-D models from imagery acquired with off-the-shelf digital cameras or other low-cost devices and processed with affordable software or apps in an almost automatic way. For this reason, a wider and wider public (often without a specific training, as archaeologists, architects, landscape planners, digital artists) is using these tools and their outcomes in many fields. However, the drawback of its ease of use is that photogrammetry is often used without any critical awareness of the metric quality of the results. Therefore, it is necessary to bridge the growing gap between the spread of photogrammetric techniques and their use through appropriate educational processes. The paper presents and explain the results of the project “Education and training resources on digital photogrammetry”, financed in 2018 by ISPRS as part of the “Educational and Capacity Building Initiative” programme. The project, after evaluating the current teaching methodologies and techniques, is producing and sharing original teaching materials (like videos and datasets) on digital photogrammetry. The aim is to transform the traditional transmissive didactic model in a newer one in which the students have an active role and improve their proficiencies solving actual case studies in practice. This induces students to rethink and better understand all the steps of the photogrammetric project design, acquisition and processing but above all to acquire greater skills to critically evaluate the acquired data and results.