Drone Mapping comparison between the top 5 Apps - Pix4D, FPV Camera, Drone Deploy
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- čas přidán 25. 07. 2024
- Late 2017 update here: • Drone Mapping Late 201...
Since mapping is getting popular with drones I wanted to run a test comparison with the main 5 available Mapping Apps. These were all flown separately at the same location within the same hour, same day, with the DJI Phantom 4.
Pix4D
FPV Camera
Drone Deploy
Altizure
Commander
These Apps all use their own different back ends to process the photos to produce their final result.
I think Drone Deploy did the best but since it's been corrupting jobs lately I can't use it, what do you think? Which did you prefer. Comments and suggestions for different platforms to test next.
UPDATE Sept 2016: DroneDeploy is seriously broken for the last month or so. It has corrupted the last several shots and I can't seriously recommend DroneDeploy for anything right now.
UPDATE Dec 2016: DroneDeploy still has some White Balance issues (switching throughout the flight) but it's not as bad as it was.
See my newer video here for a comparison of DroneDeploy on the Phantom 4 and Mavic • Drone Deploy Mapping C... - Věda a technologie
really very nice job. Thumbs up! please keep uploading more videos.
i think you should turn up the cymbals or the music in general, i can still hear your voice a bit.
Hi! Is there an app which is able to export the 3d-model with textures for further manual editing in some 3d-applications like 3ds max, maya etc?
Thanks. Great video.
hi guys .. how can i acquire autocad countor lines from 3d models?
looking forward to map a small city that have houses buildings and lots of trees.... with one do you recommend. Been thinking of using Drone Deploy..... really appreciate your reply !
Thanks! Helps me a lot!
Can you do a comparison with OpenDroneMap?
I use Pix4D for 3D mapping of mountains and quarrying areas. For mapping buildings in 3D you need to take the images in different angles and heights around the building. More number of images gives better 3D image quality.
Would like to get into mapping hope some people here can help. Have a lot of friends on properties that think this would be great for yield. But can you get moisture content dry spots and alike. I'm really new as in never used before but been flying rc for about 20 years fixed wing and now slowly drones. I'm building a Disco like drone with autonomous flight and a center pod that will be able to carry 2 kg for 45 min to 1 hour.
So an ideas where to start and if I'm looking at the right software would be great. Also with the above questions in mind is there a software package that you don't need a degree to us. I often find the software is so complicated that it's near unusable for the average person let alone a farmer who wants plug and play. Hence the gps autonomous plane will be click and launch.
I just used it for the first time today (drone deploy) and it worked perfect.
They did an update last week which fixed a few things I've found but I still can't use it for projects.
Did it change the white balance for half the shots you took?
Did it change the default settings on DJI GO for things that DroneDeploy should not have changed for you?
The last test I did the other day when I went back to DJI GO all of my video setting were messed with and needed resetting... MOV/MP4, frame rates, white balance, color mode, etc.
Thanks for the review! If you're up for it - I'd love you to try again with DroneDeploy and select 'Structures' for the processing type in order to get improved 3D models (if that's what you're looking to achieve) - you're also welcome to throw in some of the other images you captured into DroneDeploy for processing.
Thanks, I saw the Structures option was in Beta so I didn't choose it for this. I'm also uploading the orbit photos from FPV Camera to the Drone Deploy engine and am looking forward to the results.
Great! It should work pretty well for this use-case - things start to get a bit shaky when you try to process thousands of images using 'Structures', but for under 500 images you're good to go.
The resolution and detail look great now with 118 photos but the roof is still collapsed. I think I'm going to have to try a different time of day for such a reflective surface. The surrounding houses look good though.
Sound right up but can't hear you, just gave up
what's the NAME OF background music
I liked a lot your compassion but it was 2 years ago. Can you make an update test? Are you think that the programes
have evolved greatly?
I did an update between the top 2 last last year but yes they have progressed massively since this was done czcams.com/video/cV3g4QdxnF8/video.html
What fimi x8se app support for survey
i use both agisoft photoscan and drone deploy they give very good results unfortunatly i cant fly my drone right now for 4 weeks stupid firmware updates messed the drone up so its back to dji
The pix4d doesnt accept my drone ! Im using Phantom 3se
thanks for the review. some I hadn't heard about before. your voice is a bit hard to hear over the music at times. since this is about your spoken opinion I'd leave out the music or make it much lower.
And now you can add us as another player on the market ;-)
Thks a lot .... good info 👍🏻
I was wondering, what camera, or camera, or cameras were used for this project?
Can't believe I never put that on there, thanks. This was done with a Phantom 4
Thank you, and you're welcome.
Hello, thanks for your video! I have a phantom 3 pro and a s900 with Lumix GH4 and I'd like to recreate HiRes orthophoto 2D Map of the airfield where I fly. I need it for x-plane flight simulator scenery creation... Could you recommend me the best way and software for this purpose please? Regards Gianluca
Hi, the easiest way to get that would be to fly your Phantom 3 using DroneDeploy at a height you're comfortable with for the area, if there's no trees try 30 metres, basically the lower it flies the higher resolution you get out.
Take all the photos and if you're just after a 2D ortho then you can stitch it in whatever you're comfortable with, PTGui is one of the simpler ones.
You should be able to stick the final JPG in the simulator creation.
You could have a go at uploading to Pix4D or one of the others and it would let you download an OBJ file which could also be used to help create a 3D scene in the simulator.
I say use the Phantom 3 over the S900 just for ease of use, the improvement in image quality would likely be negligible in this circumstance.
Thanks a lot for all your infos! I'll try it . Regards
Sim Active seems to be a good one.
Couldn't hear hardly anything you were saying- no distracting background music would have been very welcome...
Yeah, that was so unnecessary
nice video. background audio is way to loud, a bit hard to hear
Thanks, your comment prompted me to do an update... czcams.com/video/cV3g4QdxnF8/video.html
What about georeferencing to Australian (or whatever) mapping grid and GCP support? Which apps support true 3D surface area derivation ;-) . How about trying Metaframe Pro by Agisoft, Correlator 3D by Simactive and UAVMaster by Trimble ;-) . I scored you low. Like so many drone pilots they think they can step into geomatics at the drop of a hat...
You realise that this is over 3 years old. The photogrammetry sector has drastically changed since this. Half the ones here don't exist anymore and the ones you mention didn't have relevant products at that time. Everyone assumed this area would take off and now it's barely a niche in the scheme of things.
Agisoft Photoscan do it better.
Agisoft is for stitching, not for capturing.
using Map Pilot
song name ?
It's from the CZcams Audio resource thingy. No Attribution required but this one is Seeger by John Deley. The sting is Cold Killa by MK2
Are you South African?
You should try Agisoft PhotoScan, seems it's giving good results with structures as far as I've seen.
Yeah, but you have to do all yourself with controling the drone. These aps do it themselves
Can you use one of the other pieces of software for free to just fly a grid? Then load the pics into PhotoScan Pro?
Yes, all the App's do is fly a set pattern and set the camera to time lapse mode and take a bunch of photos. All these Apps are free but most require you to sign up with an email.
If you switch to map view over the FPV you could easily fly whatever grid pattern you like manually after setting the camera to time-lapse.
The specific Apps I've listed here have their own drone flight Apps PLUS their own backend processing software. There's many more which only do one or the other.
As an architect my interest is to then insert a newly designed model into the scene. Here is a scene flown with Pix4D and the an AutoCAD 3D model inserted via Cinema 4D and shared on SketchFAB. The flown models is by landgrantsurveyors on SketchFAB and architectural model by a firm in Pennsylvania. I combined the two with Cinema 4D. skfb.ly/SQxn
I've thought about doing something similar using After Effects or Motion to add a 3D model into a video
You fly plan is not correct for that kind of subject. You should orbit around the "Tank" with a 45 degrees camera angle. and took different shots. From the top+orbit 45 degrees+ orbit 90 degrees. You merge all of this and you have the ultimate 3D model.
Absolutely agree, and ONLY FPV Camera has that option amongst these Apps.
That's why most professionals don't use the app for optimum quality. As long as the images are geo-tagged the software can figure out how to tile them together.
Agreed
The music in the background is too loud, I could barely hear your commentary and it seems like you had some good things to say.
I am very sorry, still new to narration and I don't like the videos where it's just some guy talking infant of a camera. I do plan to do another new one since ALL of these Apps have changed significantly by now. I hope to learn from my mistakes. Thanks
I agree with you 100% but in your case you seemed to have valid information. Please don't let my comments discourage you they were meant to be helpful. Thank you for your response.
great effort on the comparison but none of these are any way ready for professional paid services. currently we are offering a hires photographic survey and authomosaic options but the 3d has yet to be useable.
Thanks, I agree that none of these shown could be used for commercial purposes. However this was just to show using the default settings and automatic software to do everything.
I've found that using these FREE Apps and manually taking a heap more photos/angles as well as tweaking some of the rendering options does come up to the level used in the commercial field and companies are paying for the outputs from the Phantom series.
this is very interesting if the phantom 4 pro can cut it!
many thanks for the work.
nice music, should have been louder... I could still hear your voice somewhere in the bg :-)
Turn the music down!!!
For professional use and proper 3D mapping your have to go with Pix4D without a doubt.
i dont agree with that i did 4 tests with it overlapping 90% took 119+ photos and they all look shitty as can be
Bubba X overlapping is not the only factor that affects the quality. What was your camera angle and altitude?
If i want high resolution i would fly low and my camera angle would be around 45 degrees.
Can u share you image somewhere?
Alex walker when i get home i will my dji does straight down n i do 40m cause of trees
Alex walker www.tinyurl(dot)com/pix3dfail
I think the problem is your setting.
1. check the camera angle configuration (tinyurl(dot)com/zer86zw)
2. decrease the speed of the drone.
3. choose double gird mission from the app
4. keep the overlap at 90
5. fly low altitude if possible.
Turn your music down brother!
lol that drone deploy image looked horrible
Biased and incomplete review. It claims exclusive function for a specific Application, while in reality others can also do it. Forgot to mention so many functions in Pix4D (while claiming others are the only ones that can do it). Drone Deploy can also give irregular flight grids, even though it is not dine in a "pencil drawing" style.
Firstly, it wasn't a review. Nowhere do I mention that I'm reviewing these. It's just a quick comparison. Any Biases are yours to show.
If you're referring to the orbital/circular mission then Pix4D only offers that for the Parrot Bebop 2 for some reason.
Pix4D is one of the only bits of software to do offline conversion but the interface is outdated and horrible (not shown). I've started to use PhotoScan Pro for testing.
Regarding irregular flight grids, yes with Drone Deploy you can distort the grid once you've placed it. I was merely commenting that the drawing pencil is the default (and only) option with Commander.
Pix4D seems to have been around the longest and is probably the most used but Drone Deploy seems to have the backing of the new generation coming in with tonnes of Venture Capital Funding and marketing.
Personally I find the interface and "discovery" features of Drone Deploy to be far superior to Pix4D.
All that said, the other week I was in the field and had EVERY SINGLE APP FAIL to run (enough satellites to fly but not enough for these Apps?) and I ran through the flight grid manually with the time-lapse setting.
Apologies. Not a review but a comparison. I suggest you compare specific functions of the apps to each other then it is fair. Also remember to include AgiSoft in your list.
As an engineer I find Pix4D easy to use and with all the functionality required for technical modelling. Others simply do not have enough technical inputs. I guess the braindead interfaces of some other cloud based apps are perfect if you want to upload a model of your favourite location to google/maps for all to see.
Thanks, It started as a discussion in my small drone group and I just wanted to go over the Apps which make it easy and cover flight grid on the drone and then the back end software which pairs with the App. Separate the two and there's way more options.
I agree that Pix4D has all the options but on the Mac it just looks like it was just ported from Windows which means it doesn't really fit in well to a smooth workflow and as a non engineer the help/tutorials are difficult to parse.
AgiSoft PhotoScan Pro also looks to be ported but I haven't had as many issues with that as Pix4D software. Is there an AgiSoft drone App? I've been using it but it seems to be well made for 3D models and works well enough for mapping.
I do prefer the offline processing that PhotoScan and Pix4D offer.
So they're terrible
This video is kinda out dated