Pix4D Capture and Sequoia flight planning

PIX4Dcapture PIX4Dcapture Questions/Troubleshooting
1

Does Capture App recognize the Sequoia camera, and is flight planning possible via Capture App for Sequoia? My drone is a P3P.

2

The app should be able to make the drone fly a mission but Sequoia cannot be triggered as it is not integrated to Pix4Dcapture. The camera can, however, take pictures by setting it to GPS (trigger based on location) or timer (trigger based on time-lapse) capturing mode. Then it relies on experiment to define the correct settings to achieve an optimal overlap between images. Whether the default camera is removed or mounted side by side with Sequoia does not matter.

3

What are the camera settings that the Pix4D capture is asking for in the custom camera area?

4

Hi Ken,

 

If you are referring to overlap requested we usually recommend a minimum of 85% frontal and 75% side for agricultural projects. You can find more info on how to calculate the overlap here:

Step-1-Before-Starting-a-Project-1-Designing-the-Image-Acquisition-Plan-c-Computing-the-Image-Rate-for-a-given-Frontal-Overlap 

 

Cheers,

Ina

5

No - Im referring to the four fields for “custom camera” that pix 4d wants me to fill out. Cant get it to fly without them.

 

They are:

Focal length - I found 3.98 mm somewhere in your documentation - but there are two depending on rgb or global?

Sensor width - I cant find this anywhere

Image width - 4608 from your literature

Image height - 3456 from your literature

6

Hi Ken,

Could you please post a screenshot here with the window in which you are requested these parameters? Is it in the Capture or Pix4D Desktop?

If is in the software in the following article you can find the explanation of the parameters here. However, this should not be necessary since the camera is in our database so it will be recognized automatically. 

Thanks,

Ina

7

Its in the capture app. It won’t let me fly without filling it out. Best guesses here, but I want the right information.

 

8

Hey Ken, you can always find the information that is necessary for flight planning Pix4D Quality Report. The camera model parameters for your RGB Parrot Sequoia according to Pix4D’s camera model database are copied below for your reference.

  • Focal Length [mm]: 4.84
  • Sensor width [mm]: 6.09
  • 4608
  • Image width [pixel]: 4608
  • Image height [pixel]: 3456
9

Thanks! Great info. I didn’t think of looking in the report. I was looking through the included user manual (as advised by the app) and couldn’t find the complete information listed there. I also don’t see the focal length listed in the report… Would be nice to have it all in one place somewhere.

Question though. I take it the purpose of this camera definition is to aid in flight planning to get the correct overlap. Should we go with the information on the largest sensor? or the smallest? 

I would guess the smallest? e.g. 

Internal Camera Parameters - Sequoia_4.0_1280x960 (Red). Sensor Dimensions: 4.800 [mm] x 3.600 [mm]

10

Ken,

I initially tried to conduct flight planning using the Sequoia via Capture app, but recommend that you use the Atlas Flight for mission planning with Sequoia. This is a much more (relatively speaking) seamless workflow. The app also allows for the radiometric calibration before and after flights, and adjustment of flight parameters. Be warned though that the wifi on Sequoia is really weak, so sometimes you have to get EXTREMELY close to the camera with your phone/tablet, or sometimes have to shut down RC to get a connection to the app. The camera shutter through Atlas Flight planning is based on equal time interval, so you will have a number of images from point of takeoff and during landing that you will want to remove before processing through Pix4D. Pix4D has been great with processing the data (including the calibration images). Not to knock the Capture app, but I strongly recommend Atlas Flight for flight planning, which will save you some headaches. Good luck!

Stefan

11

@Ken, you would not have seen your camera’s focal length referenced in the Bundle Block Adjustment Details section of your Quality Report if you processed multispectral images from your Parrot Sequoia because the camera is calibrated with a fisheye lens model that does not require a focal length. However, the images’ EXIF reports that the multispectral sensor’s focal length is approximately 4.0 mm.

The camera model parameters that we have on file for the Parrot’s Sequoia RGB and multispectral sensors yield, practically speaking, similar image footprints so you can enter the camera parameters for either sensor type and will still capture similar amounts of image overlap.

@Stefan, thank you for your contribution. Good eye on removing the images that are captured while the drone flies between the mission and home point. If you’d like to see radiometric calibration image capture integrated into Pix4Dcapture, please consider posting your request in our Product Feedback.

12

Hi Team, I’m looking at the NIR information and cannot find any specs in regards to the 

SENSOR WIDTH

SENSOR HEIGHT

may you please assist? Thanks

13

Hi Travis,

Find below the specifications of the 4 monochrome sensors:

From this spec, the sensor width in mm is 4.8.
Sensor height in Pixel is 960.

Best,