What type of files does PixD manage and process?
Data produced by Pix4D can be used on all platforms on the market today. The current version of the program runs on Windows 64-bit operating system and a graphics card with hardware acceleration is recommended. Of course the data produced can be used by programs for all platforms (Windows, Mac, Linux) that are able to manage the formats generated. Let’s see what Pix4D does in detail.
Setting Pix4D Processing Options
When clicking on “Options…” a dialogue window with dedicated processing phases sub-sections will appear.
Pix4Dmapper and Analist Software
In the screen shown in Pic. 2, you can set options for the files produced by the processing of step 2 (Point Cloud Densification). The Output pane shows the files formats that represent the cloud. The LAS format is directly loaded into Analist 2014. With Analist 2015 it is necessary to pre-process the LAS files with Autodesk Recap in order to load them later. By activating the option “Generate 3D textured mesh” a full three-dimensional mesh of textures in the OBJ format will be created in the output folder of filet. The mesh size is defined in the “Maximun Number of Triangles” box. By default the mesh is set at 1,000,000 triangles; It might be useful to set it to a reduced size to have higher management efficiency if it were used to send a file by e-mail. A value suitable for the terrain models could be less than 10,000 triangles.
Pix4D Three-dimensional PDF files
Particularly appreciated is the possibility to create a three-dimensional PDF. This document must be displayed with Acrobat Reader and is not properly represented in the windows 8.1 PDF viewer. Therefore if you send this document, for example, by e-mail, it is recommended to report this issue.
The Pix4D orthomosaic: geo-tagged TIFF
Pic. 3 represents orthomsaic generation options. The format is the georeferenced TIFF. Analist includes the function (in the Utilities section) which enable you to load the Pix4D TIFF and place it in the defined chart. This is particularly useful if you import the contour lines (defined in the panel in Pic. 4) which will be positioned exactly on the orthomosaic.
Contour line creation
In Pic. 4 you can enable the creation of contour lines. This option is not normally active, and you must do it as often as necessary. Of course by activating the “Set as Default” option it will not be necessary to set it in subsequent processing. The product is also available in DXF file format, and, importantly, extremely small. The “Elevation Interval” option represents the distance between the curves. It ‘a good idea to “classify” properly the point cloud to isolate vegetation, infrastructure etc … before processing the contour lines. This option can be called when you need the Process menu. Pic. 5 shows the menu screen that activates the functions.
For example if you need to change the interval of the contour lines (Pic. 4) just open the Process menu and the Generate Contour Lines function. Particularly interesting is the Generate Google Maps function. It is possible to represent the processing directly on Google Maps and Google Earth.
