Photogrammetric

Part of speech: adjective

Definitions

1. Relating to the science of determining the size and shape of objects by analyzing photographs taken from different viewpoints
2. Describing techniques that extract precise measurements and three-dimensional information from photographic images
3. Of or concerning the process of mapping and measuring physical features through the analysis of overlapping photographs

Etymology: "Photogrammetric" is a plain adjective built from "photogrammetry" and the suffix "-ic", meaning relating to or done by photogrammetry, the practice of measuring objects and terrain from photographs. The suffix comes from Latin "-icus", which passed through Old French "-ique" and Middle English "-ik" before settling into English as "-ic". Its ancestry therefore runs back through the same suffix that gives English hundreds of adjectives such as "magnetic" and "electric". The real interest lies in the first half, "photogrammetry". Its two parts are Greek: "phōs" (light) and "gramma" (something drawn or written), joined with "metron" (measure). Read literally, the word means measuring by means of light-drawn records, an apt description of how a photograph becomes a map of distances and shapes. The word "photogrammetry" appears in the source data's chain through its Proto-Indo-European and Latin-style suffix history only in part, so the Greek building blocks are the clearest route into the word's meaning.