Assessing the Quality and Stability of Photogrammetric Point Clouds Derived from Stereo UAV Imagery

Description: Remotely-sensed data from UAVs are increasingly being used to evaluate landscape condition. This report provides a systematic evaluation of the impact of target complexity and light conditions on the quality and stability of point clouds extracted from stereo imagery acquired by UAVs. Digital surface models were measured against reference LiDAR data at two different field locations in Alberta to gain insight into the factors affecting the quality of topographic models acquired from UAV data, and to highlight optimal conditions for high-quality data acquisition from UAVs.