3D bathymetric surfaces of low- and high-relief sites from the coral reef flat off Waiakane, Molokai

3D bathymetric surfaces of low- and high-relief sites from the coral reef flat off Waiakane, Molokai, were created using structure-from-motion (SfM) techniques. The two study sites are located approximately 640 m from shore and approximately 20 m apart in the alongshore direction. At each site, an approximate 12-meter diameter area was imaged in three passes by a swimmer using a handheld digital camera. These images were fed into Structure-from-Motion (SfM) software to produce high-resolution (fine-scale), accurate, and precise topographic point clouds with sub-centimeter accuracy for both the low- and high-relief sites. In addition, a subset of a previously published (Logan and Storlazzi, 2022), coarser-scale, 3D bathymetric surface of the reef flat immediately surrounding the two study sites is included. The point clouds are formatted in LAS (.las) format.

These data accompany a manuscript by Norris and others (2023) [Norris, B.K., Storlazzi, C.D., Pomeroy, A.W.M., Rosenberger, K.J., Logan, J.B., and Cheriton, O.M., 2023, Combining field observations and high-resolution numerical modeling to demonstrate the effect of coral reef roughness on turbulence and its implications for reef restoration design: Coastal Engineering, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.coastaleng.2023.104331].