Photography aids scientists

Scientists took to the sky in America to photograph tens of thousands of tracks left by dinosaurs.

A helicopter was used to criss-cross the Moccasin Mountain Track site in the south of Utah to snap images of fossilised footprints left by several species of dinosaurs who lived there over 180 million years ago.

The team used a Nikon D3 with both a 24mm and 50mm lens to capture the unique photographs.

"During the mission we made several fly overs at various heights above the surface" said Neffra Matthews, the geographer from the BLM's National Operations Centre in Colorado who conducted the imaging work.

Neffra said: "The resulting imagery had a pixel size of approximately 0.5cm on the ground, which, in theory means an object that is a size of 1cm should be distinguishable in the photographs."

The images will be used to create a 3-D picture of the tracks, which the scientists hope will help them learn more about the dinosaurs who lived there.

"We will process the images into a base map which will then be used for research and interpretation," said Neffra.