Virtual Surveyor introduces ‘terrain lenses’

By on 5 June, 2019

Virtual Surveyor has announced a new set of tools to enhance different aspects of 3D terrain when processing UAV-derived imagery and point clouds.

Version 6.3 of Virtual Surveyor has introduced six new ‘lenses’ to assist analysis and processing of 3D orthophotos and point clouds by highlighting different terrain aspects.

Tom Op ‘t Eyndt, CEO of Virtual Surveyor, said that the new features speed the generation of accurate topographic end products and help position the tool between photogrammetric processing software and engineering design packages.

“Whether a drone surveyor is generating map products from orthorectified imagery or LiDAR elevation data, our new Terrain Lenses provide richer insights into the topography,” he said.

“Instantly applied with a single click or shortcut, the lenses can be used alone or together to achieve different effects.”

Virtual Surveyor has released the following descriptions of the new terrain lenses:

Hill Shade lens – Designed mainly for application on a Digital Surface Model created from LiDAR data without an underlying ortho, the Hill Shade lens simulates sun illumination casting shadows on the scene. The result is enhanced 3D perception of hills, valleys and other relief.

Contours lens – This lens creates smooth contours over the terrain. It helps to trace the route water would take as it flows through the terrain. Also, when cleaning ‘noise’ from a water body, this lens assists in tracing a boundary at the same level.

Transparent lens – Ideal for areas where topographies change quickly and hide previous states, this lens allows the user to look through one terrain model to see the surface, boundaries or breaklines from a different day.

Slope Direction lens – Designed for better understanding of hydrology, this lens places arrows over the digital surface model to show the direction of water flow throughout the scene.

Slope Steepness lens – When the terrain is too bright or dark in an orthophoto, it can be difficult to detect breaks in the terrain to draw breaklines. This lens colorizes the slopes to highlight breaklines.

Elevation lens – This lens automatically colorises the terrain so that ground surfaces of the same elevations appear in the same colors, giving the user an easy understanding of the highs and lows of the landscape.

The newest version also includes updates to the software’s split lines tool, its Q-points algorithm and copy/cut/paste tool. Existing users will be automatically upgraded to the latest version.

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