Orthoimagery

The Montana Spatial Data Infrastructure (MSDI) Imagery Framework layer relies on the imagery products produced by the National Agricultural Imagery Program (NAIP).

About

Digital Orthoimagery are georeferenced images of the Earth’s surface. Displacement of objects has been removed for sensor distortions and orientation and for terrain relief.

Many geographic features, including those that are part of the Framework, can be interpreted and compiled from an orthoimage. Orthoimages can also serve as a backdrop to reference the results of an application to the landscape.

Access the Orthoimagery collection the following ways:

• Browse the collection online through the 
  • Montana Air Photo Browser
  • Montana Digital Atlas 
  • Montana State Library web map services

• Order Aerial Photos - Users can order aerial photos in TIFF format.
• Download aerial imagery files for use with your software

Imagery Working Group

Overview of the Montana Imagery Working Group, June 2024

• Upcoming Meetings:
  • To Be Announced
  • Meetings are announced through GovDelivery.  Sign up here and choose to receive, "News & Information on the Montana Spatial Data Infrastructure, Montana authoritative GIS datasets" and "Imagery."
• Past Meetings:
  • May 15, 2024  Agenda | Presentation Slides
  • April 17, 2024 at Big Sky GeoCon, Presentation Slides
  • March 20, 2024  Agenda | Presentation Slides
  • February 14, 2024  Agenda | Presentation Slides
  • Inaugural Imagery Summit & Working Group Meeting (December 12-13, 2023)
    • Agenda with links to presentations and recordings
    • Presentation Slides
  • Past meetings and presentations (2006 - 2008): Link

Download Imagery

This collection of Downloadable Aerial Photographs of Montana includes:

• Compressed county mosaics of the NAIP images for 2005, 2009, 2011, 2013, 2015, 2017, 2019, 2021, and 2023 
• Statewide USGS black and white digital orthophotos collected between 1946-1977, and 1990-2003, and
• Several regional air photo collections

View Web Services

Web Services for National Agricultural Imagery Program (NAIP) Data:

• 2023, Natural Color and Infrared
• 2021, Natural Color and Infrared
• 2019, Natural Color and Infrared
• 2017, Natural Color and Infrared
• 2015, Natural Color and Infrared
• 2013, Natural Color and Infrared
• 2011, Natural Color and Infrared
• 2009, Natural Color and Infrared
• 2005, Natural Color
• 2005, Infrared

Web Services of Historic Imagery:

• 1990-2003, USGS Digital Orthophoto Quarter Quadrangles (DOQQs)
• 1946-1977, Aerial Images from the USGS Single Frame Archive (Mid 20th Century)

Future Collections

• NAIP for Montana is typically collected every two years. The 2025 NAIP is currently in the process of being collected.
• The NAIP was last collected in 2023. The entire state was not collected in 2023. The rest was flown in 2024, but the Library has not yet received the 2024 imagery.
  • The NAIP 2023 Compressed County Mosaics are available from the Montana State Library. The county mosaics include the imagery collected in 2024. 
  • View a map of the 2023 coverage.

Applications

Montana Air Photo Browser
This is a web application for viewing the web services listed above, downloading county mosaics, and determining image dates

Montana Digital Atlas

Additional Sources of Aerial Imagery

• Montana State Library Air Photo Collection
• U.S. Geological Survey Aerial Photo Finder
• U.S. Dept of Agriculture Farm Production and Conservation (FPAC) Geospatial Enterprise Operations (GEO)
• NRCS Geospatial Data Gateway
• Esri World Imagery service and Wayback Viewer