OxTS georeferencing and boresight alignment software

OxTS Georeferencer is a software tool developed by OxTS to combine INS navigation data with raw LiDAR data. It can be used alongside any OxTS Survey INS to create a georeferenced 3D Pointcloud.

OxTS Georeferencer takes a file collected with a LiDAR scanner (synchronised in real-time with an OxTS inertial navigation system), a processed navigation trajectory file from the OxTS INS, and some required configuration files, to create a LAS pointcloud file that can be viewed in many 3rd party LiDAR software packages.

Furthermore, thanks to our experience in calibration techniques, we have been able to develop a data-driven technique that helps system integrators and end users to start their work with confidence that their INS and LiDAR hardware has been installed precisely and accurately. This is the boresight calibration feature.

We offer the software free to download and provide example data for testing purposes. Using the data you can go through the process of georeferencing a pointcloud and use the boresight calibration tool to practise setting up your survey. You can download the test data and software from our support site and also view several support articles to help you get up and running – OxTS support site

We greatly value our customer’s feedback. Your feedback helps us drive the development of future products. If you have used OxTS Georeferencer please tell us about your experience by completing our feedback form here – OxTS Georeferencer feedback

OxTS Georeferencer Infosheet

Download the complimentary OxTS Georeferencer information sheet and learn how you can confidently georeference raw LiDAR data from multiple sensors.

The infosheet contains key information about the software including:

The potential applications for which OxTS Georeferencer can be used
LiDAR integrations
Key features

OxTS georeferencer Infosheet

LiDAR Surveying Brochure

OxTS inertial navigation systems provide users with absolute position and highly accurate inertial measurement information. This information allows them to georeference pointclouds from multiple LiDAR sensors.

These measurements help users increase survey repeatability, cut down the time to survey, intelligently analyse data, improve final results and increase project ROI.

Case Study: UAV Bridge Survey

Dronezone Case Study

OxTS Partner Dronezone were tasked with scanning an aging railway bridge to identify potential weaknesses in its structure.

Once they made the decision to survey the bridge using a UAV, there were a number of challenges they faced, specifically around payload weight, flight time, data processing and pointcloud accuracy. This case study details how they overcame them.

OxTS Georeferencer Process Flow

OxTS Georeferencer’s main function is to synchronise and fuse the OxTS INS and LiDAR data sets.

A LiDAR sensor can sense range to a target, but it has no internal knowledge of when or where it is, or where it has moved to since the last scan occurred. This is where the INS adds essential information:

Nanosecond accurate time (Survey grade GNSS receivers)
RTK/PPK accurate position (Survey grade GNSS receivers and tightly-coupled navigation engine)
Accurate heading, pitch, and roll (Survey grade IMU sensors)

Thanks to live accuracies being reported as well, the data can be intelligently filtered based on estimated position/orientation accuracy of the INS, allowing you to perform less clean-up of the data in post-processing.

OxTS Georeferencer Process Flow

OxTS Georeferencer ‘How To’ Tutorial

Learn the basics of using OxTS Georeferencer with this short tutorial video and understand more about:

How to use OxTS Georeferencer and the different files required for the compatible LiDAR sensors
How to check your surveying route and the different processing options OxTS Georeferencer offers
The georeferencing, pointcloud creation feature

The tutorial also includes an introduction to the boresight calibration tool available within OxTS Georeferencer, and shows example pointclouds.

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Time Overlap Chart

The time overlap chart within OxTS Georeferencer gives surveyors the ability to both visualise their survey route on a map and choose the start and end times of their survey.

This feature provides added flexibility when it comes to deciding which parts of the survey they wish to view or present.

3D Hardware setup viewer

To help LiDAR surveyors input the correct relative rotation angles of their OxTS INS and LiDAR sensor, OxTS Georeferencer includes a 3D hardware setup viewer.

The LiDAR model in view will change depending on the user’s choice of sensor. This feature enables quick and intuitive survey configuration.

Global Coordinates

Process data in a range of coordinate systems including:

Local coordinates
ECEF
LLA (latitude, longitude and altitude)

Processing Options

Maximise the usability of pointclouds and minimise data size through a range of processing options.

Filter points by uncertainty keeping every point within a specified accuracy
Maximise the accuracy of the data while minimising data size with a Voxel sampling algorithm
Filter points by intensity and azimuth and elevation angle of the LiDAR
Filter points by speed and range from vehicle

Easier to create map files

Allow mesh surfaces to be easily reconstructed by adding the direction from which each point is surveyed into the pointcloud. Furthermore, users can view the vehicle trajectory as a pointcloud.

Processing advances

Advanced algorithms allows users to process pointclouds faster than ever before. Take advantage of improved precision and consistency of the boresight calibration feature which now utilises target dimensions.

Boresight Calibration

Boresight calibration is an essential part of INS and LiDAR integration.

If the coordinate systems of the two devices do not match perfectly then the georeferencing of LiDAR data will diverge over longer ranges and result in a less accurate pointcloud.

OxTS Georeferencer includes the ability to boresight supported LiDAR devices in order to ensure the user can produce clean and reliable data every time.

The results of running a boresight calibration are sometimes very clear, and sometimes marginal, but the objective is the same – align all sensors on the vehicle to the same coordinate system to ensure a high level of accuracy, regardless of a predefined test scenario.

A boresighted system allows for complete flexibility over the way you perform a survey.

“As an engineer I do not know a simple tool which could precisely measure angles between INS and LiDAR to a tenth of a degree. OxTS has solved this issue elegantly with the use of tools already present for LiDAR surveying. Running a 10 minute data collection between two reflective targets (which are cheap and easy to build) is the most difficult part. Given the well documented OxTS guides the next step is a simple matter of selecting the collected data files in OxTS Georeferencer and pressing the “Run Boresight Calibration” button. It really is as simple as that and after specifying the calculated angles the pointcloud accuracy improved significantly even visible to the human eye”

Andri Karo, Systems Integration Specialist, Skycorp Oü

Boresight Calibration Brochure

Precisely calibrating the angles between your survey (LiDAR, camera) and navigation (INS) devices is a critical part of any survey. If the angles aren’t measured precisely enough, it can have a negative effect on your final results.

Employing a data-driven technique can help you quickly and easily overcome this challenge.

Read the OxTS Boresight Calibration brochure to learn how this can be achieved.

OxTS Boresight Calibration

Webinar: Improving LiDAR surveying applications with a data-driven approach to hardware set-up

OxTS Webinar Image

Earlier this year we presented a webinar where we discussed using data for boresight calibration. During the webinar attendees had the opportunity to:

Learn why this calibration is so important.
Understand how adopting a data-driven technique to calibration can help you streamline operations and increase ROI.
See example before and after calibration results.

The webinar was recorded and you can watch it back here.

Boresight comparison slider

Comparison1 – Full environment pointcloud

The below ‘full environment’ pointcloud clearly shows the difference between a boresighted and unboresighted pointcloud. The ‘before’ example suffers from blurring and double vision whereas the boresighted ‘after’ example is much clearer and the blurring and double vision has been eliminated.

Comparison2 – Targets only

The below before and after examples clearly show the difference between a boresighted and unboresighted pointcloud.

The examples below show two 80 cm x 80 cm square targets. In the ‘before boresight’ example you can clearly see the targets suffer from double vision and appear as four. However, once the angles between the INS and the LiDAR sensors have been calibrated using a data-driven technique, the double vision has been completely eliminated and the two targets are clearly visible and much sharper.

Comparison3 – Roadside survey

The view here shows a cross-section of a street taken during a roadside survey. In the ‘before boresight’ example it is clear to see that there is a discrepency in the angles measured between the east and west passes of the street.

However, in the ‘after boresight’ example the east and west passes are almost identical leading to a much clearer, precise pointcloud.

Check if your LiDAR device is supported for Boresighting and Georeferencing by taking a look at the ‘supported devices’ tab or by downloading the OxTS LiDAR Survey brochure

Contact OxTS at info@oxts.com for more information, or check out our sample data!

Manufacturer	LiDAR model	Software version required	Status
Velodyne	VLP-16 Puck / Puck Lite	1.0 (or later)	Tested
Velodyne	VLP-32C / VLP-32MR	1.2 (or later)	Beta
Velodyne	Alpha Prime VLS128	1.2 (or later)	Beta
Velodyne	HDL-32	1.5 (or later)	Beta
Hesai	Pandar40	1.4 (or later)	Beta
Hesai	Pandar40P	1.2 (or later)	Tested
Hesai	Pandar 40M	1.4 (or later)	Beta
Hesai	Pandar64	1.4 (or later)	Beta
Hesai	PandarQT	1.4 (or later)	Beta
Hesai	Pandar128	1.4 (or later)	Beta
Hesai	PandarXT-16	1.4 (or later)	Beta
Hesai	PandarXT-32	1.4 (or later)	Tested
Ouster	All Gen2 (32, 64 & 128 versions of OS0, OS1 & OS2 sensors)	1.2 (or later)	Beta
Ouster	OS1-64	1.2 (or later)	Tested
Livox	Avia	1.5 (or later)	Tested
Livox	Mid-40	1.5 (or later)	Tested
Livox	Mid-70	1.5 (or later)	Beta

The software versions in this table relate to the following software version numbers – 1.0 = 20.1.15.34193, 1.2 = 21.0.15.0 and 1.4 = 21.06.04.0.

Please ensure you are using the latest firmware offered by the manufacturer unless it is stated otherwise that you need a different firmware.

NOTE: 3rd party INS devices are not supported due to the data manipulation for synchronisation and quality assurance; specific accuracy and status messages from NCOM are required for processing.

We are currently working on making many more LiDAR sensor models and manufacturers compatible with OxTS Georeferencer and the boresight tool. If you are interested in other LiDAR sensors being supported by OxTS Georeferencer, contact us at info@oxts.com. We may already be planning to integrate the sensor you want!

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Example Pointclouds

The below pointcloud examples have been produced using OxTS Survey Inertial Navigation Systems and a Velodyne VLP-16 LiDAR sensor. The data was georeferenced using OxTS Georeferencer.

The example pointcloud data is free to download and use.

Open Road

This data was collected using an OxTS xNAV INS and a Velodyne VLP-16.

The LiDAR was mounted to the rear window of the vehicle in order to create the highest density view of the road surface in the resulting pointcloud.

Data can be downloaded here

Tree Canopy

This data was collected using an OxTS xNAV INS and a Velodyne VLP-16.

The LiDAR was mounted to the rear window of the vehicle in order to create the highest density view of the road surface in the resulting pointcloud.

Data can be downloaded here

Airfield

This data was collected using an OxTS xNAV INS and a Velodyne VLP-16.

The LiDAR was mounted on the front of the roof at an incline of 10 degrees in order to ensure the best field of view of the road ahead and building features in the surrounding area.

Data can be downloaded here

Before boresight calibration

This data was collected using an OxTS xNAV INS and a Velodyne VLP-16.

The Inertial Navigation System/LiDAR payload was mounted on a DJI Matrice 600 pro UAV that was custom made by the user.

Data can be downloaded here

Retroreflective targets before boresight calibration

After boresight calibration

This data was collected using an OxTS xNAV INS and a Velodyne VLP-16 .

The Inertial Navigation System/LiDAR payload was mounted on a DJI Matrice 600 pro UAV that was custom made by the user.

Data can be downloaded here

Retroreflective targets after boresight calibration

Raw data files

The below raw data files are free for users to download and use. OxTS Georeferencer requires a LiDAR file (pcap or lcom), a navigation data file (ncom) and hardware configuration files (lip, lir and vat).

There are a number of raw data files available to use. These are from a survey completed using an OxTS Survey+ v3 INS and a Velodyne VLP-16 LiDAR.

Raw data files can be downloaded here

There are two NCOM navigation files. One of these is the full survey that includes both the boresight and the road survey. The other is cropped for the boresight only.
There are two LCOM LiDAR data files. One of these is the road survey and one is the boresight. These do not have to be recorded separately.
There are both calibrated and uncalibrated configuration files that have been calibrated using the boresight calibration functionality.
There is one VAT configuration file.