Image Capture

Weather Conditions 

Weather conditions can have a great effect on the quality of the images that your UAV or aircraft captures. While it may sound counterintuitive, optimal data capture happens when weather conditions are cloudy. These conditions allow for uniform lighting within an entire set of images and also reduce shadowing of objects throughout the site. If weather conditions are not cloudy, we recommend flying when the sun is at its highest point, around noon (12 pm) to reduce distortions due to shadows in the images.  

Image Overlap 

In order to build an accurate 3D model that yields high-quality drafting results, later on, you must also prepare to conduct a flight which encourages sufficient image overlap, both front-overlap, and side-overlap. AirWorks recommends setting your flight to 80% sidelap and 85% frontlap to get the best results from photogrammetry and subsequently your drafting results.