Hi all
New here so please forgive any questions that might have been posted before. I did a search and couldn’t find anything about this subject.
The question is pretty simple. Can I use Litchi for tower inspections? I would like to make 3D models using a Mavic 2 Pro.
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Hello @Greg_Watkin ,
One option that you can use in Litchi is the Orbit mission.
You pick the center of the orbit, set the radius, speed, rotation direction.
After you begin your orbit, you can vary the height manually and take as many images as you want.
Export the images to an image processing program to build your model.
Thanks Sam_G. That sounds OKish. I guess the radius is the main thing as well as being able to set the centre of the orbit. Presumably you can fly to where you want the centre to be and enter the point in the app then fly to the required radius and again set that from the camera position. Can you set the number of pictures to take before starting the orbit? I don’t want to pay for yet another app that doesn’t do what I need is the bottom line.
No Greg, there isnt a setting to control the number of images or the frequency to take a picture. The Orbit mission is used primarily for video use. You would have to manually take pictures. I agree with you, its OKish, but not perfect.
Another idea is to position your drone (at the base or the top), then change only the altitude slowly while taking pictures. Rotate (manually) around the tower and repeat the process going up and down while snapping pics.
Doesn’t sound great tbh. Taking pictures manually is time consuming when several hundred or even a thousand or more are needed. I guess you could take a video then extract the stills from it but still time consuming and while quality might be ok from 4k footage I doubt it would be as good as fully automated stills. Moving the camera manually creates all kinds of inconsistencies that might affect the outcome. I think Litchi isn’t what I need. Sounds like it’s more geared for video.
There are software companies that are geared specifically for tower inspection but most of them are quite expensive. If the cost is being passed on to a company, then it might not be an issue.
Are you wanting to fly a spiral mission up (or down) the height of the tower while pointing at the tower and taking as many photos as you can throughout the mission?
You could try this superb spiral mission program, and then set
the drone to take pictures every 5 seconds or so.
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