I Want One!

I would rather have one of these:
http://www.gatewing.com/x100

Yeah those are nice too but you would have to worry about having a place to land one; flat ground is hard to come by here in WV. The vertical take-off and landing of the "Scout" would be a selling point here. The other side of that is that if you have a mechanical failure, the winged units could glide to a landing while the chopper types would just crash.

A while back there was an article in one of the magazines about someone doing photogrammetric mapping with photos taken by an ordinary handheld camera from a light plane. Anybody remember which, and when?

> I would rather have one of these:
> http://www.gatewing.com/x100

I would rather have one of these.

Mark:

Try this.

http://www.profsurv.com/magazine/article.aspx?i=70968

I thought it was a really interesting article too. I guess you need the Topcon software to make it work with any camera.

T.W.

Thanks, Tom

> Try this.

That's it!

Thanks, Tom

Amazon sells the civilian version.

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B003ZVSHB0/ref=pe_69240_21135960_pe_epc_d1

> Yeah those are nice too but you would have to worry about having a place to land one; flat ground is hard to come by here in WV. The vertical take-off and landing of the "Scout" would be a selling point here. The other side of that is that if you have a mechanical failure, the winged units could glide to a landing while the chopper types would just crash.

Yeah, thats one of the drawbacks of the Gatewing, but I dont believe the Scout can do orthophotos or mapping, its just a videocamera mounted on a UAV.

Thanks, Tom

Apparantly the FAA has restrictions on flying these things within controlled airspace (ie/ in the vicinity of human habitation, for all practical purposes) above treetop level. That would put a real cramp in any use of these UAVs for mini-photogrammetry.

Thanks, Tom

I believe the FAA is currently rewriting the regulations concerning commercial use of UAVs and is planning on having the new regs out sometime in 2012

Thanks, Tom

Could we be putting photogrammetry into the toolbox of every workaday land surveyor?

Thanks, Tom

> Could we be putting photogrammetry into the toolbox of every workaday land surveyor?

I hope so. I saw a system at Intergeo last year (I don't remember who made it) where you entered the lat/lon of the four corners of the area you want flow, the UAV flies it using onboard gps for navigation, then you download the digital pictures straight from the UAV into the post processing photogrammetry software.

Yeah it does do orthophotography. As to the height restrictions, according to the guys from the company that demo'd yesterday, as long as you stay under 400' (model airplane space) your ok but if you get under 100' over private property you are trespassing. I haven't checked any of that out myself but that was what I was told.

> Yeah it does do orthophotography. As to the height restrictions, according to the guys from the company that demo'd yesterday, as long as you stay under 400' (model airplane space) your ok but if you get under 100' over private property you are trespassing. I haven't checked any of that out myself but that was what I was told.

I'm not 100% sure, but I think the model airplane space "exemption" from FAA regulation is dependent on your not using the aircraft for commercial purposes.

Thanks, Tom

I think that's basically how the gatewing works.
and I believe you are correct about the FAA regs being revised to handle uavs