Evolution of Photogrammetry

Thomas Koch

Photogrammetry Today A broader variety of applications require geospatial

data

Construction Building status monitoring

Agriculture Natural Research

Cadastre Tourism Archaeology

Planning Forestry Land Use Telecom-munication

Mapping Cities

Acquisition Processing Analysis Data hosting

Needs to specialize!

Data Acquisition

The application defines the best suited acquisition method and processing routines– Data availability, time for preparation, processing, scale, precision,

area size

RealWorks Inpho

TBC PMUASMaster

Expertise

How much photogrammetric expertise can we expect for a specific application?

Ease of use vs. advanced processing (flexibility) Less interactive possibilities vs. more interactive options to ensure success on more

challenging projects Expert quality assurance required? Less expertise vs. more expertise required

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Challenge for software development

How to ensure precision, proof with “low expertise” software?– Application specifies the target precision level and

complexity– Highest accuracy, reliability requires expertise!– We need: More automation, easier workflows with

“expert” mode/tools

How to address data volumes

Dense point clouds High resolution orthos ... How to store/host massive data How to share and distribute

Web data hosting Web Service

Web Service

Local SoftwareLocal data hosting

Web data hosting

Local data hosting

Local Web Store

Sending Data

Web Store / Download

Storage capacity

Compression

Intermediate data

Local / Web

Effects on Software Development

Web applications Computer evolution (memory, CPUs,

Clusters...) Demand for complete “vertical” solutions “connected devices” (mobile, desktop...) Combining all data from different sources

Software needs to specialize

According to input data– UAS (large or small)– Aerial Frame– Pushbroom– Satellite– LiDAR– Survey

Software needs to specialize

According to Application to provide most suitable and smooth workflow– “vertical” market requirements

Area Size, Scale Ease of UseExpert Level

Precision Level

Analysis Hosting

Necessary Technical Changes

Cameras– Lower geometric quality / stability– Higher resolution– Radiometry– Spectral (e.g. thermal)– Correction methods

Matching Techniques– FBM-LSM-SIFT...SGM

Automated analysis workflows (eCognition) Web-Services

Inpho technical evolution

How high resolution cameras affect earth curvature corrections– “traditional” way (ASPRS manual of photogrammetry) proposes a simplified formula

e.g. with consideration of a mean terrain height per image, only– Revised formula implemented in INPHO ( see K. Krauss Band2 3rd Edition ) considers

individual height values

K. Kraus Band2 3rd Edition p176 5.4-6Without second term (ASPRS)

Case Hf above ellipsoid delta in micron delta in micron

A 125 0,0871 0,09

B 1125 -1,4808 0,09

C 2125 -3,0487 0,09

Traditional way proved to be accurate enough while resolution of

cameras was still coarser! Corrections would have been about

1/10 pixel

For high resolution cameras, difference gets significant! Corrections range up to about 1 pixel

* A lot of software is not taking care of that fact!

Most robustVery slowAccurate

Less robustSlower

Very accurate

Robust,Quick,

Coarse

Evolution of algorithms The right algorithm for the right input

– Different characteristics of input data– Different requirements for deliverables– Why is specialized software so important? Example UASMaster:

Characteristics:• Lower geometric quality of

cameras,• Lower quality of

approximations• Larger orientation angles• Lower image quality (smears,

motion blur...)• Larger image scale

(perspectives)

Robustness over speed

FBM

LSM

SIFT...

Characteristics:• high geometric quality

of cameras,• high quality of

approximations• small orientation

angles• Good image quality• Smaller scale

Speed over robustnes

UAS Trad. Photogr.

UASMaster is different Fully automatic one-stop solution

(AT/georeferencing, cameracalibration, DTM/DSM, trueortho or traditional orthomosaic)

Optional break-points and parametrization Addtional QA/QC Full stereovisualization and more

manual/automated editing capability

Complete INPHO in one tool, limited to UAS data

Based on adapted and now even more advanced INPHO core algorithms

TBC-PMUASMa

sterinpho

Level of expertise

Example: Quality Editing (UASMaster)

Georeferencing refinements Automated / manual

DTM/DSM/Ortho editing

Evolution of data density and quality

Quality improvements for dense matching (point clouds)

comparison

Evolution into space

Satellite triangulation capability in MATCH-AT– Drivers:

quick acquisition for huge areas Surveying hazardous areas Surveying areas that are hard to access

– Key to success: Full automation (e.g. tie point measurements) Rigorous quality assessment and refinement options Accurate and reliable georeference Seamless workflow to follow-up tasks (DTM/DSM,

Ortho...feature extraction)

Evolution of format variety

Driver– Variety of applications– Variety of software solutions– Variety of acquisition methods– Recent additions: Trimble Geoids

LAS1.4LAS compression

EXIFJPEG XR

JPEG 2000

Camera Conversion

Multi-IMU support

Additional transformations /

projections

Evolution of tools and workflows

Keep it simple– Reduce complexity

All georeferencing in ONE tool– Frame imagery– Pushbroom imagery– Satellite imagery

Evolution of tools and workflows

High performance point cloud

visualisation

Polygon Checks

Automatic correlation based

terrain following for 3D measurements

More effective batch conversions,

editing, deliverable creation for point

clouds in DTMaster

Evolution of workflows

More automation– E.g. automatic flight line adjustment for LiDAR

strips

See you at InterGEO!