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S900, inspire 1 pro with x5

Uroplatus

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A request for advice

I use the drone mainly for mapping. I care about the maximum resolution of photos. I used the phantom 3 until now. Often I had to fly low to have good resolution, which caused accidents. That's why I want to change the drone. I can buy the S900 and attach to it the sony s7 camera (full frame) which I have. Or go to inspire 1 pro with x5. I know that photos from sony will have better resolution. However, inspire is much more mobile in the field. Can anyone advise me if flying S900 from sony is much more difficult? I mean autonomous flying and terrain mapping, with Phantom it is very easy, thanks to Pix4D.
 
I wonder how often rolling roller x5 (free flight) occurs? I'm beginning to agree to x5 with a 45mm lens. From this page ((Ground Sample Distance) GSD Calculator) comes out that GSD with this lens is very good. I often use Agisoft. However, I often have to find individual pictures of specific objects and it seems that x5 with a 45mm lens will be the best solution.
 
I'm flying the Inspire 2 with the X5, and 25mm lens for mapping. I'm doing my mapping at 300 feet, with 65/75 overlap and the client loves the finished product. I"ve been told it isn't accurate enough for surveying.
 
I have used a Microkopter and a Sony alpha 6000 with Pancake. Now switched to phantom 4 pro, which is easier, cheaper and provides the same accuracy.
Martin
 
I have mapped many missions with the phantom 3 pro, inspire and x5, as well as the phantom 4 pro. The main drawback of the inspire setup is bettery life per flight and the speed you must fly to accomodate the fact that a jpeg can only be stored about every 2.5-3 seconds. I went between my 15mm and 12mm lenses for mapping but the one thing you must remember is that when you use a longer lens to get better GSD(I.e. the 45mm) the footprint of your photos is much smaller which means many more photos just be taken to cover the same area and achieve the same overlap. This could triple the required flight time and data set and mean you need many many more batteries and a more capable PC for processing with agisoft. I would recommend taking a good look at the p4p, its footprint is almost identical to the i1 x5 with the 12mm lens and achieves a GSD of 0.7" at 200'. Sure the a7 under the s9000 will get great imagery but i think you'll be running into the same battery life issue and then you must figure out a way to geotag your images since i dont think the a7 has that feature.
 
I'm flying the Inspire 2 with the X5, and 25mm lens for mapping. I'm doing my mapping at 300 feet, with 65/75 overlap and the client loves the finished product. I"ve been told it isn't accurate enough for surveying.
65/75 overlap wont cut it even for 2d mapping if you want accuracy. 80 front/70 side is really the lowest you can go to achieve accurate results in a 2d orthomosaic...80/80 is minimum for survey grade 3d accuracy and then you still need enough GCPs that are properly placed. Of course this is just what ive found to be true for me, some others may have different opinions but my work requires absolute accuracy and over the last few years that is what I've found to to be true.
 
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We've been using a P4P with 75/75 overlap. Flights at 210' to 280'.
The field proof surveys have shown excellent topographic results. Better then normal A/C flights.
Maybe I'm missing something.
 
Better than normal A/C isn't saying much, I regularly see vertical error of 0.5' to 1.5' in traditional manned aircraft photogrammetry data. "Excellent topographic results" could mean an inch, a foot, a meter...what are you actually seeing? I couldnt nail down accuracy under a few inches until I passed the 80/80 mark. So if you're saying that your seeing results within 3-6 inches and those are excellent maybe we just have a different definition of what that is.
 
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When we proof our flights, the crews check hard points, manholes, curbs, slabs, GCP's, we then interpolate contours to get as close an idea as we can. Results of .10 to .25' are common. For a topographic map, that usually assumes 1/2 a contour interval, is good topo in our neck of the woods.
We have also tried a cross hatch flight at 65 degree camera angle and a second flight at 90 degree angle.
I agree with the number of GCP's. We are adding more with every flight.
What do you consider excellent results?
 
I decided to inspire 1 pro with x5. Mainly because of interchangeable lenses. I am going to buy 25mm and 45mm lenses. I will use these lenses depending on how accurate I want to have the resolution in the picture. I know that batteries compare with P4 is a problem but you can not have everything.
 
Personally, I do own an Inspire1 Pro/X5, and the battery flight time is horrible and cost of repairs match.
One hard landing=$1300 Zenmuse X5 + lens.
The S900/X7 is a hell of a lot of cash to do a lot of small jobs and the odds will catch up sooner or later.
I have found nothing better than the P4P for practically everything I need to do.
With my record of one in the river and another doing the Rockwell hardness test on the NV desert floor, not to mention several shell and part replacements, I'll stick with the P4P for most everything.
 
When we proof our flights, the crews check hard points, manholes, curbs, slabs, GCP's, we then interpolate contours to get as close an idea as we can. Results of .10 to .25' are common. For a topographic map, that usually assumes 1/2 a contour interval, is good topo in our neck of the woods.
We have also tried a cross hatch flight at 65 degree camera angle and a second flight at 90 degree angle.
I agree with the number of GCP's. We are adding more with every flight.
What do you consider excellent results?

Anything under 0.1' per pixel would be deemed good results. With an 80/80 overlap and flying at an altitude that gives me a 0.5 GSD with enough GCPs and CPs, that is pretty realistic. Using 5-10 Aeropoints and then additional checkpoints makes all the difference. Flying with your overlaps below 80/80 is just a pretty picture for mapping purposes.
 

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