Open Source GIS and Volumetrics

Today our class learned about open source GIS and volumetrics from Christina Hupy.  She has a background in academia and the GIS industry.  She has taught GIS in Wisconsin for 11 years and decided to take the opportunity to speak with our class about the GIS world of open source.

Above is a Litchfield image processed from an open source platform.  The free open source program used to process this image was Open Drone Map.  This program is incredibly useful for people who cannot afford the enterprise programs that cost thousands of dollars.

Volumetrics

Within Open Map Drone, one is able to calculate volume of certain objects within the orthomosaic.  This is made possible because the program creates a DSM along with the orthomosaic.  The DSM contains the different elevations within the image.  In combination with the program also getting the horizontal measurements, the program can calculate the volume of objects.  For example we can calculate the volume of a mound within the orthomosaic.  The images below show the process for calculating the volume.

First we must outline the pile that we prefer in order to pinpoint exactly what we want calculated.  If there were any objects above the mound we desire to measure we can simply delete the points in the point cloud for anything above the mound.  Once deleted, the mound will automatically fill the void area to finish the mound.

We then make sure to include a DSM  of the selected area to ensure we are calculating the right elevations.

After the area is selected, the processing tab at the bottom of the program will automatically calculate the volume.  For my area chosen the volume was 305.82m^3.

Having open source software is incredibly useful due to the fact that the public is constantly giving patches to help improve the program.