3689610031?profile=originalWe were excited by Pix4D’s Chillon project (http://pix4d.com/chillon/) and decided to make our own 3D reconstruction attempt using our U[g]CS software, DJI Phantom + GoPro and, of course, Pix4Dmapper.

Now we want to share how we made 3D reconstruction of our office.

Pix4D has recommendations for different type of targets. For buildings they recommend to execute two flights around the building with different altitudes and camera angles:

3689609851?profile=original

(The image is taken from the Pix4D site)

For a small building it’s possible to take all shots in a single flight, but in most ground station software it’s hard to plan missions where two or more waypoints are located in the same position, but at different altitudes.

Using U[g]CS we can easily create such waypoints thanks to true 3D environment:

3689610050?profile=original

So we planned a single mission around our office with two rounds around the building. DJI Phantom 2 autopilot is limited to 16 waypoints, but in this case it wasn’t a problem because we set GoPro to take one shot every half a second.

This is how the mission for our Phantom looks like:

3689610179?profile=originalAfter a very short flight we have got 395 pictures. They were loaded into Pix4D projected and processed by point cloud building algorithm.

First of all, we were impressed by how precisely Pix4D has restored drone trajectory (first picture in this post). More accurately in comparison with GPS track.

And here is the result of point cloud visualization of our office made in Pix4D:

3689610117?profile=original

We have also 3D reconstructed another object close to our office — fuel tank station at the airfield:

a600c467aeb9f9ab3cda37585a587215.gif?width=700

3D point cloud animation is available for download here.

Taking into account fully automated processing workflow and our zero experience in 3D reconstructions, we think that achieved results are quite good. Next time we will try to get more accurate results by combining different drone trajectories, ground control points and processing modes in Pix4D.

Sincerely, U[g]CS team

U[g]CS

E-mail me when people leave their comments –

You need to be a member of diydrones to add comments!

Join diydrones

Comments

  • Hi Patrick,

    UgCS should work with any DJI autopilot excluding Naza-M Lite. If you will meet any difficulties please write me.

  • Hi great! i hope this works also with my F550 with Naza V2 and BT Module

  • Hi all!

    Version with DJI support published on our site in Products & Services/Download section. Build 1.3.43.0.

    Enjoy and we are waiting for your feedback!

    (Here -http://ugcs.com/documentation - you can find DJI connection manual).

  • Hi, Hamed!

    Yes, with "Ardupilot UgCS One" version it will be possible to control both APM and Pixhawk based boards. The only requirement is to have Ardupilot software. So in theory, any other HW will also work, as soon as it runs Ardupilot SW.
  • Alexey , Eventhough I have multiple DJI autopilots , but I want to check your software with my Pixhawk autopilots . I want to use it for my multirotors and fixed-wings which all of them use Pixhawk. So , is it possible to use ugcs one instead of Pro for this purpose . the main two differences between "One" and "Pro" which you've mentioned are "one type of vehicle" and "not-support multi-operator mode" . so , is it possible to control all of "Mavlink-based" vehicle with ugcs one ?

    Regards

  • Thank you! great news! i hope takes not to long...

  • Yes, material for this post was made with new non-published release. Unfortunately we can't publish it today, but it will be available very soon.

    New release will support DJI autopilots. Connection to DJI FC can be made via DJI Datalink.

  • this mean the description was done with this new version? how to connect to DJI FC?
  • Forthcoming build of UgCS will support DJI autopilots. It will available very soon - may be tomorrow evening if we won't find new serious bugs.

    We tested it only with Phantom 2, but it should work with any DJI autopilot through DJI Data Link.

  • Hi work U[g]CS Open together with Naza FC ? i can not found any information about this, I think DJI only support their own Ground Station Software

This reply was deleted.