1

How to get
survey results
6X faster with
drones

Case studies from PCL,

McKim
How &results
to get survey Creed, and
6X faster with more
drones
 2

Drones are
making surveying
simpler, easier, and
faster than ever
before.

Jake Thompson
All American Surveying

How to get survey results 6X faster with drones

Table of contents
I. Introduction 4

II. Use cases 5

III. Part 107 6

IV. Buying criteria 7

V. Drone survey workflow 10

VI. Case study: All American Surveying 12

VII. Case study: PCL Construction 14

VIII. Case study: Bogh Engineering 16

IX. Case study: McKim & Creed 18

X. Conclusion 21

How to get survey results 6X faster with drones

Introduction
4

Right now, theres a big shift underway in the surveying industry:

drones have finally matured to the point where theyre saving time
and money on projects across the world.

Indeed, as the title of this book suggests, its possible to cut time in
the field by at least 6X, which is exactly what one of our customers
was able to do on a topographic survey project. The benefits run
further than just speed, however: drones help surveyors collect more
detailed data, and theyre also helping improve safety and reach
inaccessible areas.

For those looking for a complete drone platformwhich is a

combination of both the actual drone, analytics software, and
enterprise-ready supportit can be hard to figure out how to get
started. How does a survey drone work? What kind of data can it
collect, and whats the workflow like? Whats the ROI, and who has
implemented drone solutions successfully?

In this book, we set out to answer all of these questions and more.
Well share the basics of starting, implementing, and getting value
out of a drone program, and well also share how firms of all sizes,
from 2-person survey providers to leading companies like PCL
Constructionhave successfully brought drones into their projects,
established a simple, scalable workflow, and driven measurable ROI.

Ready? Lets take off.

How to get survey results 6X faster with drones

Use cases
5

Heres the first thing you need to know: drones usually collect data Topo survey for cut-and-fill
faster, cheaper, and safer compared to other traditional methods,
and often with comparable accuracy. This kind of versatility has
opened up a variety of use casessurveyors are looking for ways to
incorporate drones into their projects to perform them faster and
more frequently, at higher margins. As Bill Bennington, National
Quality Manager at PCL Construction, said, If you can demonstrate
how you can improve an existing process with the use of a better,
more efficient tool, every project will want one.

Drones have certainly demonstrated just how efficient they can be,
especially in a few key use cases:
Measuring stockpiles
Topographic surveys of large or inaccessible terrain
Faster, more detailed cut-and-fill analysis and comparison
Verifying grade elevations and QA/QC of earthworks
Safer, easier stockpile and volume measurements
Capturing as-builts for documentation and renovations

How to get survey results 6X faster with drones

Part 107
6

On August 29th 2016, the commercial drone industry took a Take a practice FAA test
monumental step forward: the FAA released the Small UAS rule,
commonly known as Part 107, which made it possible for anyone
to legally fly a drone for commercial purposes if they pass a remote
pilot certification exam. Before Part 107, commercial drone pilots had
to earn a regular pilots license, which is meant for manned aircraft,
not remote drone flights.

Part 107 has opened up the skies: since coming into effect, the
number of commercial drones in US skies is expected to grow tenfold
from now until 2021, a rise from approximately 40,000 to over
400,000.

Want to get Part 107 certified? Weve created a free online

practice test for the FAA
In order to bring drones into your projects and start flying them Remote Pilot Certificate
for commercial uses, you or a member of your team will need to exam. Want to see how you
earn Part 107 certification. Its the first step to any successful drone fare? Take the test here.
operation.

We have created a number of Part 107 resources that thousands

of people have used to study and successfully take the exam. Want
to dive in? Check out the FAA drone rules, the expert study guide,
try the interactive practice exam, and then find a test center to take
your exam. Once you have someone on your team thats Part 107
certified, youre ready to pick a drone platform for your business.

How to get survey results 6X faster with drones

Buying criteria
7

Thinking about bring a drone into your next project, but have no idea 3D mesh created using
what buying criteria to consider? We can help. Our customers, such drone data
as PCL Construction, Kimley-Horn, and McKim & Creed, have defined
a number of factors to consider when buying a drone solution. They
can be distilled into 5 guidelines:

1. Data, not video

The initial use case for drones in the AEC industry was to take photos
and shoot videos for marketing purposes. This can still easily be done
with consumer-grade drones, but these drones dont have the same
capabilities when it comes to collecting data, which calls for more
advanced hardware and software that can capture and process high-
resolution imagery, create 3D models, and more.
Point cloud created using
2. Data quality (absolute and relative accuracy) drone data

Accuracy requirements vary depending on the customer and their

use case, but typically our customers measure accuracy on two
fronts: absolute and relative accuracy. Absolute accuracy measures
the degree to which a point on your drone map compares to the
same point in the real world, while relative accuracy measures how
much a point on your map is accurate compared to other points.
PCL Construction, for example, decided that they needed absolute
accuracy within a tenth of a foot and relative accuracy that was
greater than 99% compared with traditional methods.

How to get survey results 6X faster with drones

3. Image quality 8

With photogrammetry engines like Autodesk ReCap, you can Lens distortion impacts
turn your drone images into data. This makes image quality a key model quality
criterion, and resolution (ground sampling distance), sensor size
of the camera, and image lens distortion are three great metrics to Irregular & high
compare solutions on. Lens distortion, as the example to the right lens distortion
shows, will ultimately affect the quality of your 3D model.

4. Interoperability & workflow

What tools do you use in your day-to-day work? Whatever they may
besuch as Autodesk, ArcGIS, Esri, or Bentleychoose a drone
solution that closely integrates with your existing workflow. For
example, PCL Construction heavily relies on Autodesk products like
AutoCAD, Civil 3D, and ReMake, so it was vital that their drone data
could be exported into filetypes that worked with these tools.

5. Support Even & low

lens distortion
Having dedicated, responsive customer support engineers is a vital
part of any effective drone solution. Proper onboarding, education,
and ongoing assistance helps get you to value faster. Also, when
choosing a drone solution, make sure that youre able to get a
backup drone in case you have any hardware problems on-site.

How to get survey results 6X faster with drones

 9

We wanted to
have a simple
workflow and a
scalable product.

Bill Bennington
National Quality Manager
PCL Construction

How to get survey results 6X faster with drones

Drone survey workflow
10

Surveying with a drone has never been simpler. Using our own Set your flight path and the
platform, Site Scan, as an example, heres the complete drone to data drone will fly itself
workflow:

1. Mission planning

The first step in any successful drone survey is proper mission

planning. Using Site Scan Field, our iOS app, you can quickly map out
the area you want to survey by placing a polygon over the desired
area and adjusting it as you please. Site Scan will automatically create
the flight path in order to most effectively cover the area of interest.

There are a few key considerations in flight planning, such as flight

altitude, estimated flight time, ground sampling distance (resolution
in inches per pixels), survey area in acres, number of photos that Review images and upload
will be captured, and number of batteries required. These will vary to the cloud
depending on the unique needs of your job and the size of the site
youre planning to survey.

2. The flight

Finished planning your flight? Now youre ready for takeoff. Press
Fly Survey, and the app will run through a simple checklist to
ensure that the drone will take off and fly safely. Once the checklist is
complete, you can begin the flight and the drone will take off and fly
the pre-determined flight path with no need for manual control.

How to get survey results 6X faster with drones

3. Processing and managing data 11
Process into orthomosaics,
Once your images are uploaded to Site Scan Manager, theyre point clouds, and more
processed automatically into an orthomosaic even while youre still
in the field. This is done through Autodesk ReCap, a photogrammetry
engine thats built into Site Scan. After a few hours, your flight will
finish processing, and the next step is to review the data back at the
office in Site Scan Manager. You can view the original images and
orthomosaic, and easily send them with stakeholders through a
public link.

4. Exporting data to use in Autodesk, ESRI, Bentley, and more

The last step? Putting your drone data to good use. As mentioned
earlier, your drone solution should work seamlessly with the tools
you work with on a daily basis. In Site Scan, the following file formats
are available to export: Export and use in
Autodesk, Bentley, and
Ortho (orthorectified georeferenced image and raster DEM) other tools
RCM (ReCap 3D mesh)
RCS (ReCap point cloud)
FBX (Autodesk 3D mesh)
OBJ (Open-source 3D mesh)
LAS (Open-source point cloud

How to get survey results 6X faster with drones

Case study
12

All American Surveying

Based in Gainesville, Texas, All American Surveying is a full-service
survey firm run by Jake and JT Thompson. To save time and collect
more detailed points on a specific project, they decided to use a
drone to do a topographic survey of a 90-acre site in order to provide
6X
Faster time to deliverable
their client a cut-and-fill analysis. using a drone
They set 5 ground control points to increase accuracy, performed the
survey in a matter of hours, and had the final deliverable finished in
days.

The result

Jake made his time to deliverable 6X faster by using a drone. A

traditional survey of this site would take approximately 18 days to get
to the final deliverable: on a site of this size, it simply takes longer in
the field and to process the data. On this project, Jake was able to cut
this down to just 3 days. Also, as JT said, We were able to collect way
more points, and provide data on anything in between: dips, humps,
stockpiles, and more. With the drone, we found areas with excess
dirt, which we couldnt have found conventionally.

Cut-and-fill analysis
created with drone data

How to get survey results 6X faster with drones

 13

Drones are
increasingly
our go-to tool
for topographic
surveys.
Jake Thompson
All American Surveying

How to get survey results 6X faster with drones

Case study
14

PCL Construction
In early 2017, PCL Construction broke ground on the first-ever
Crystal Lagoon project in the United States. Just north of Tampa,
Florida, the 7.3 acre lagoon will be the centerpiece of a 3,000 home
developmentfuture residents will be able to swim, kayak, and enjoy
the beach right in their backyard.

The lagoon was the first of its kind on US soil, and there were a
number of challenges for PCL to overcome in order to ensure that
the project went smoothly:
PCL performed regular drone
survey for quality control and
1. Verify grade elevations at key stages of the project
providing progress updates
2. Prioritize and focus quality control work, given the size of the site
3. Quickly and easily share progress updates to stakeholders

On a site like this, it would typically take a week to perform a

traditional survey, process the data, and finalize the PDF, CAD file,
and contours. By using a drone to cloud solution, PCL was able to cut
this process into just 1.5 days and performed more focused quality
control on the ground.

How to get survey results 6X faster with drones

 15

With a drone
solution, PCL
Construction
reduced its
survey time down
from 1 week to
just 1.5 days.

Request a demo >

How to get survey results 6X faster with drones

Case study
16

Bogh Engineering
Based in Beaumont, California, Bogh Engineering is a 3rd generation
family-owned construction and engineering firm run by Mark Bogh,
a 30-year industry veteran. Bogh Engineerings core capability is
pouring concrete, but they also perform other work to prepare a site
4X
for concrete construction: surveying, demolition, and site grading.
Less time in the field
compared to traditional
On a school construction project, Bogh needs to survey the site methods
frequently, after every major activity. A typical survey was taking 1-2
days of work: their one-man survey crew would walk the 17 acre
site and measure 324 points in total. Then, post-processing in Civil
3D, in order to perform a cut-and-fill analysis, took another day. We
needed a solution that helped us quickly and frequently run surveys, Now, it only takes me two
Mark said. A drone was the perfect fit. days instead of weeks to
survey all my 14 active
Now, to make their workflow more efficient, Bogh Engineering uses construction sites with Site
the 3DR Site Scan drone platform to survey the site in approximately
Scan
30 minutes, then the images can be processed into an orthomosaic
and 3D point cloud in about 3 hours, adding up to a half day of work
in total. Compared to 2 days, this is a 4X in productivity in the field. Mark Bogh
Owner, Bogh Engineering

How to get survey results 6X faster with drones

 17

Data processed
with Site Scan
is much more
granularit
allows for much
more accurate
cut-and-fill
analyses.
Damian Garcia
Bogh Engineering

How to get survey results 6X faster with drones

Case study
18

McKim & Creed

Founded in 1978 in Raleigh, North Carolina, McKim & Creed is one of
the top surveying, engineering, and geomatics firms in the US. For a
number of years, Christian Stallings, Head of R&D, kept a close eye
on the evolution of drones and how they could be used as a survey
4X
tool. Eventually, he decided to systematically test drones compared
Less time in the field
to traditional surveying and LiDAR, and evaluated each of these compared to traditional
methods on three criteria: accuracy, cost, and ease of use. methods

To test these criteria, McKim & Creed put drones to the test on 3 real-
world survey projects: a beach, a stone jetty, and a waste disposal
site. Using 3DR Site Scan, they flew each site, processed the data in
the cloud, and generated topographic maps, orthomosaics, point Our goal is to have a
clouds, elevation models, and contours. standardized drone in
every McKim & Creed
On every site, the drone outperformed both traditional surveying surveyors truck.
and LiDAR on cost and speed, while having comparable accuracy.
In fact, they found that drones, depending on the project, cost
approximately 30%75% less than traditional surveying and 15% Christian Stallings
80% less than LiDAR. R&D Manager
McKim & Creed
Now that drones have earned their place in the McKim & Creed
surveyors toolkit, Stallings and his team are now focused on scaling
their drone operations to more projects across the company.
Our goal is to have a standardized drone in every McKim & Creed
surveyors truck.
How to get survey results 6X faster with drones
 19

McKim & Creed

found that drones
cost 30-75% less
than traditional
methods, and
15-80% less than
LiDAR, depending
on the project.

Request a demo >

How to get survey results 6X faster with drones

 20

During the past 50 years,

surveying and engineering
measurement technology
has made five quantum
leaps: the electronic distance
meter, total station, GPS,
robotic total station and
laser scanner. Drones will be
the sixth quantum leap in
technology.

Frank Willis
Forensic engineer & surveyor

How to get survey results 6X faster with drones

Conclusion
21

From use cases to Part 107, workflow to case studies, we hope youve
found this guide to be an effective introduction to using drones as a
surveying tool.

Were still very much in the early days of the commercial drone
space: as of writing, Part 107 is not yet even a year old. Yet, the
industry has already transformed, and it is helping surveying,
construction, and engineering firms improve the way they collect and
process data, manage their projects, and more. With their speed,
low cost, and safety improvements, drones have quickly become a
crucial tool on job sites across the worldand were only just getting
started.

Wed love to hear what you think. Feel free to email us at hello@3dr.
com with any thoughts, questions, or feedback.

Thanks for readinghappy flying!

How to get survey results 6X faster with drones

 22

3DR is a leader in the commercial drone Looking for more stories?

industry, building products specifically for
architecture, engineering, and construction Check out our blog for the latest
professionals. from the 3DR newsroom >

Our flagship product, Site Scan, is a complete

drone to data platform for surveyors and
AEC professionals. Its the complete package Get ready for Part 107
for businesses of all sizes and includes a
drone, software for the field and the office, Use the 3DR study guide,
enterprise support, and the educational practice tests, and more >
resources you need to succeed.

For more information, visit 3dr.com

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How to get survey results 6X faster with drones