Category Archives: Lidar/Imaging
Mainstreaming Augmented Reality: No Headset Required, Part 1
Augmented reality technology is rapidly evolving into the mainstream; now you can employ and enjoy AR on your smartphone. Let’s start with Apple’s ARKit, a software developers’ kit (SDK) for augmented reality. Apps developed on this platform will work with all iPhones and iPads that use the A9 or A10 processor and are running iOS...
Night in the Afternoon: A US Solar Eclipse
What you need to know about the 2017 solar eclipse The upcoming solar eclipse will leave a 70-mile-wide trail of darkness across the United States on August 21, 2017 (see the map of the eclipse path on pages 44-45). This will be a once-in-a-lifetime event for many people. While another total solar eclipse will make...
The GeoDude on the Adoption of Laser Scanning Today
Part 2 Above: Although not yet fully mainstream for topographic surveys, laser scanning is frequently used to topo sites with a lot of detail and hardscape. Credit: Allegheny Surveys. With new and emerging technologies such as laser scanning, many professionals want to know “When is the right time to get in?” They may worry about...
Behind the Big Eye of the SX10: Trimble, Danderyd, Sweden
A visit to Trimble’s engineering and production center in Danderyd, Sweden, reveals the story of the SX10’s development. As surveyors, we purchase and use some of the most sophisticated instruments of any field-oriented profession. Such sophistication yields incredible precision, accuracy, reliability, and flexibility, and, as would be expected, can carry hefty price tags. With such...
The Unthinkable and the Thinkable
The following is the editorial for the July print issue of xyHt magazine: If we completely dismiss a notion as unthinkable, we might find ourselves ill prepared should the notion become an eventuality. This applies to how we might view the status of our professions and how we fit into the markets we serve. Is...
HxGN LIVE 2017 Takeaways
The big buzz among those interested in laser scanning was Leica’s BLK360 laser scanner (pictured above as demonstrated to xyHt editor Gavin Schrock). The small, affordable ($16k) scanner was originally jointly announced by Leica Geosystems and Autodesk at AU 2016 in November. At HxGN LIVE 2017, attendees learned that scanner shipments had begun. The BLK360...