Mapping with E382 and DroneMapper
I just wanted to share a mapping mission I ran last week with the E382 from Event 38 (my company) and processed with DroneMapper.com.
The reason these results are somewhat noteworthy is the amount of time it took to make this. I pulled up to the flying field, setup the plane in maybe 5 or 6 minutes. I hand launched the plane, flew around manually for exactly 5 minutes, taking 110 pictures in that time. Brought it in for a quick landing in some bushes then I packed up and went home. At home I uploaded the images straight to DroneMapper without even reviewing them. A few hours later, DM came back with really awesome results. All of this took just a few minutes of my time not counting the drive to and from the field.
My setup on the E382 is as follows:
- Skywalker 168cm Airframe
- APM 2.0 with ArduPlane 2.4
- 3DR Telemetry Radios 915MHz
- Canon Powershot SX230 HS with CHDK
The camera is really what made this so quick.. with built in GPS all the images are geotagged automatically as they're taken. This mission was actually done to see if it could keep a GPS lock for the entire flight which it did. Having the images geotagged and processing them with DroneMapper returns files that can be analyzed (as in the image above) for things like the elevation profile of any path, the length of a path, the area of a field and so on. There are nice tutorials on how to get started with that in the DroneMapper FAQ.
Measuring the length of a trail
Measuring the area of low lying vegetation
Extracting the coordinates of a point of interest
-
Comment by JP on July 16, 2012 at 2:34pm -
Nice write up and great work on the E382 flight platform! Mapping is too fun..
-
Comment by Toby Mills on July 16, 2012 at 3:18pm -
What is the dronemapper pricing like for doing something like this?
-
Comment by JP on July 16, 2012 at 3:46pm
-
@toby I don't want to hijack Jeff's thread but it is based on area and GSD. We often just process your job for free if we are bored and server is free.
I have to say that after viewing almost 10k of images and bunches of ortho/dems.. the E382 is doing an amazing job for the price. Right up with the big boys! Congrats Jeff.
-
Comment by Jeff Taylor on July 16, 2012 at 3:58pm -
Don't worry JP, the thread is about both! I'm pleased with the results so far and I am thankful for your help in analyzing the results, they're helping me improve the platform.
-
Comment by Cala on July 16, 2012 at 4:12pm -
Nice work Jeff, How you mount your camera?
-
Comment by Jeff Taylor on July 16, 2012 at 4:23pm
-
Very simply, I just rest the camera in the bottom of the airframe and cut a hole for the lens. I use CHDK to shut down the camera and retract the lens before landing (depending on what kind of terrain I'm landing on).
-
Comment by Cala on July 16, 2012 at 4:35pm
-
Thanks
-
Comment by ggtronic on July 16, 2012 at 9:05pm -
subscribe... thanks to share ! i'm having a bad time to find a camera that work well with USB trigger gadget...wanted to use a new 16pmx model... but canon CHDK doesnt seem to support them... actually trying to hack a NIKON s9300...
-
Comment by Jeff Taylor on July 16, 2012 at 9:26pm
-
Yes I've been down that road before.. I was also using CHDK at that time but I was sending pulses from APM to CHDK to tell ti when to take a picture. It ended up being too messy in the plane, too much work to set up and it needed a ground script aftwards to match up when the pulses were sent to the picture that was subsequently taken. This method is much simpler and in the future more and more and more cameras will have a GPS option.
I have no idea why but almost no cameras have an intervalometer feature. Seems so easy to include, I'm not sure why almost no companies add it.
-
Comment by Manu on July 17, 2012 at 12:59am -
Well done Jeff, that's looking good!
Wondering if you can acheive the same quick result from the other Canon (A2200), which doesn't include a GPS? Maybe with the addition of the APM log in a way or another?
Social Networking
Top Content
Contests
Season Two of the Trust Time Trial (T3) Contest has now begun. The fourth round is an accuracy round for multicopters, which requires contestants to fly a cube. The deadline is April 14th.A list of all T3 contests is here.
Groups
-
ArduPlane User Group
721 members
-
Andropilot Users Group
203 members
-
ArduCopter User Group
1356 members
-
DIYDrones News Team
5 members
-
Melbourne
54 members
Advertisement
© 2013 Created by Chris Anderson.
Powered by
You need to be a member of DIY Drones to add comments!
Join DIY Drones