Aerial surveys have become increasingly popular in recent years due to developments in the technology available. Survey professionals now rely on the incredible benefits offered by unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) or drones, allowing users to carry out a wide range of surveying tasks with ease. If you’re looking for an aerial analysis of a building, a drone aerial survey is the best choice right now.
What are Drone Aerial Surveys?
A drone aerial survey refers to using an unmanned aerial vehicle or drone that uses sensors that face down, including LIDAR payloads, RGB or multispectral cameras, to capture data from the air. In every aerial drone survey, you can take photographs of the ground from various angles several times. Every image is tagged with coordinates, so you know exactly where it was taken.
Drones are sometimes referred to as UAV (Unmanned Aerial Vehicle), UAS (Unmanned Aerial System).
Now you know what is used to complete an aerial survey, we can focus on the benefits of aerial surveys for your business.
1. Accurate Surveying
The huge developments in UAV and camera technology in the last ten years have meant drones can use cameras that shoot up to 5.2k resolution imagery and video. Having such pixel density at our disposal ensures that aerial surveys are completed to the highest accuracy possible.
Drones also feature the latest stabilisation techniques so they can capture ultra-high definition images, even in the most challenging weather conditions. The increasing use of GPS, mainly real-time kinematics, in drone software ensures complete accuracy.
2. Health & Safety
Surveying can be a tough job, especially in dangerous or structurally sensitive environments. Using a drone for an aerial survey ensures there is minimal risk to surveying professionals and the general public. Every bit of data is captured with ease from the air, leaving you with very few health and safety concerns. This means that you can spend less time planning the needs of huge health and safety considerations, allowing you to turnaround the entire project quickly.
3. Access Anything
Analysing hard to reach locations has never been easier thanks to the use of UAVs. By harnessing the skills of an experienced drone pilot and a pre-planned survey, drones can access roofs, masts, towers and tall buildings easily. With high definition imagery and remote access, you can be sure of a thorough inspection of the subject in question.
4. Increased Survey Speed
The flexibility offered by aerial surveys means large areas of land can be covered in a short amount of time. Planning the drone flight also helps increase the speed that a drone survey is completed in. From the initial planning to data processing and product delivery, aerial surveys greatly reduce the time spent on the project offering great customer satisfaction during time sensitive projects.
5. Cost Savings
When compared to other surveys, drone aerial surveys come with low overheads and reduced costs. They also open new possibilities and perspectives in relation to what is possible with an aerial survey. Before, it would have cost a huge amount of money and required complicated logistical plans, while drones make more things possible for surveying professionals for a fraction of the cost.
Benefits of Aerial Surveys for Different Industries
While the list above features general benefits for aerial surveys, there are various benefits for different industries.
Cartography and Land Surveys
If you’re looking at an area with outdated or poor quality data, aerial surveys can generate incredibly detailed 3D models and high-resolution images. Drones also have the capability to produce cadastral maps easily and quickly, even in the most complex of environments.
Surveyors can analyse the data and extract features such as kerbs, drains, markers and roads from the images. It’s also possible to show the 3D reconstruction of building or land sites in high-quality detail.
Land Development
For land planning and management, drones can take aerial photographs and make topographic surveys faster. It can help for allotment design and planning, scouting sites and with the construction of buildings, roads and utilities.
These detailed models will support site topography in pre-construction engineering studies. Data collection is repeatable with aerial survey drones if needed and at a very low cost.
Urban Planning
With urban planning, traditional methods of surveying leads to expensive and time-consuming data collection of dense urban areas. However, urban planners can use drones to collect a vast amount of data with fewer people and in a faster time.
With existing environmental and social condition data of locations collected from drone images, planners can consider the effects of various changes. They can easily overlay buildings in their environment with the use of 3D models.
During the construction of homes and buildings, the images could then be used for progress reports as the build continues. Later, images can be captured for virtual tours for marketing purposes to sell homes.
If you want to feel the benefit of aerial survey services, get in touch with the team at ScanTech Digital who are ready to discuss your aerial drone survey requirements.
Categories: Technology