The International Archives of the Photogrammetry, Remote Sensing and Spatial Information Sciences
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Articles | Volume XL-1/W2
https://doi.org/10.5194/isprsarchives-XL-1-W2-87-2013
https://doi.org/10.5194/isprsarchives-XL-1-W2-87-2013
16 Aug 2013
 | 16 Aug 2013

PERFORMANCE EVALUATION OF A LIGHT-WEIGHT MULTI-ECHO LIDAR FOR UNMANNED ROTORCRAFT APPLICATIONS

G. Conte, A. Kleiner, P. Rudol, K. Korwel, M. Wzorek, and P. Doherty

Keywords: UAS, LiDAR, Sensor Fusion, Inertial Sensors, Photogrammetry

Abstract. The paper presents a light-weight and low-cost airborne terrain mapping system. The developed Airborne LiDAR Scanner (ALS) system consists of a high-precision GNSS receiver, an inertial measurement unit and a magnetic compass which are used to complement a LiDAR sensor in order to compute a digital surface model. Evaluation of the accuracy of the generated surface model is presented. Additionally, a comparison is provided between the surface model generated from the developed ALS system and a model generated using a commercial photogrammetric software. Finally, the multi-echo capability of the used LiDAR sensor is evaluated in areas covered with dense vegetation.

The ALS system and camera systems were mounted on-board an industrial unmanned helicopter of around 100 kilograms maximum take-off weight. Presented results are based on real flight-test data.