Need help with Aerial mapping - iPad app?

[hogar]

Hi guys. Could you please suggest me some solution for flight guidance in aerial mapping tasks. I'm not a pilot, so I don't have much knowledge about flight or navigation. My part of the job is land survey. I'm just trying to find solution for my pilot. The idea is that I can give him screen (iPad, or something else) preloaded with waypoints (parallel flight lines) and he must fly that pattern. I have been searching in available Ipad and PC applications but hasn't been able to find any of them who has dedicated purpose for aerial mapping. I don't even have clear picture what I'm searching for or how is it called. All i learned for now is that app I'm looking for must have left/right arrows and distance indicating how far from the track plane is. Second thing that I think is necessary is high refresh rate on GPS (external bluetooth solution?) Here is clip I have find what it must look like: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LaJYkxG74T0 So, I don't need any maps, just graphical indication of plane position related to area of interest.
I thought you may recognize what I need and suggest some solution.

Thank you...

 

[JHW]

how big is the area? what you are describing sounds like a cropduster system on a much larger scale

if the area is big enough i would think you could just create waypoints in any of the ipad apps (foreflight, etc) and build a flight plan from them.

if you have an ipad there is a free trial for foreflight, you might want to install it and play with it to see if it will work for you. You don't need an airplane to test the concept.

 

[MAKG1]

He may have the "app" already in his avionics. Sometimes those can drive autopilots as well. And the "left-right arrows" are called a course deviation indicator, and there is always one associated with an aviation GPS.

Apple may advertise that they have apps for everything, but they aren't always the best solutions.

 

[thegazelle]

Someone else might come up with something more elegant, but a rough way to get this done would be to get Foreflight as suggested, and create waypoints manually, or using lat/lon points to do so. Unless you can find a way to import waypoints into Foreflight, putting them in manually is going to be tedious. Here is an example I made:

http://imgur.com/mlw5g2x

Foreflight will give you your track error (arrow left/right) in increments of .1nm, which is 607ish ft.

You can change the view from what I have (the street map) to a sectional (aviation map) with ease. I just chose the street map view because it's easier to see the lake with which I made the example.

For your bluetooth GPS, you have several options. Manufacturers include, Garmin, Bad Elf (Pro Model), and XGPS.

The Bad Elf Pro touts 10 hz refresh rate, and its configurable with the Bad Elf companion app. I believe the XGPS models only go to 4-5 hz according to this forum, and the Garmin does 10hz according to this blog post.

The Bad Elf Pro also has the ability to log your flight using the onboard memory, and can export the data in KML format (you xfer the trip data from the Bad Elf to your ipad via bluetooth). I only have experience with the Bad Elf Pro and XGPS150.

I hope this information is enough to get you a decent start.

 

[alaskaflyer]

Most Garmin products beyond the lowest scale consumer units can accept waypoint, route or even full map layer information from an external source and overlay it. I used to do this all the time on my Garmin 296 (and 76Sx at work.)

 

[alaskaflyer]

Hi guys. Could you please suggest me some solution for flight guidance in aerial mapping tasks. I'm not a pilot, so I don't have much knowledge about flight or navigation. My part of the job is land survey. I'm just trying to find solution for my pilot. The idea is that I can give him screen (iPad, or something else) preloaded with waypoints (parallel flight lines) and he must fly that pattern. I have been searching in available Ipad and PC applications but hasn't been able to find any of them who has dedicated purpose for aerial mapping. I don't even have clear picture what I'm searching for or how is it called. All i learned for now is that app I'm looking for must have left/right arrows and distance indicating how far from the track plane is. Second thing that I think is necessary is high refresh rate on GPS (external bluetooth solution?) Here is clip I have find what it must look like: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LaJYkxG74T0 So, I don't need any maps, just graphical indication of plane position related to area of interest.
I thought you may recognize what I need and suggest some solution.

Thank you...

And so, what are you using to generate the route info, and in what format is that data? ESRI?

 

[hogar]

Thank you guys for your suggestions. Over weekend I have tested some apps. So far, Foreflight is the only with potential. It has option to import waypoints and to show simple streetmap of my area (in Europe). It has track-up option with map following. The bigiest cons. is that it has limited zoom. I don't know precise scale, but I think I will need some more zoom to be able to track route. Maybe some of you who have experience in aerial mapping would know better, but I think plane needs to be be flown in a track no wider than runway. Foreflight has crosstrack error indicator but it has resolution of 0,1nm which I find unpresice.
The other solutions I have been searching for included Garmin portable GPS units. This is one solution that could work: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4RGxZhFBhQE Unfortunately, after intensive comparation between actual models I have found that model from this video has been discontinued, and it is the only one who had map range (max zoom) up to 20feet. All current models including Garmin's high end now has max zoom up to 200feet. I was really surprised when I saw this and don't know why Garmin has decided to cripple their devices.
Somehow I think that technical needs for this aplication are simple and available trough out many apps and devices but not included in just one of them. Just to resume my needs:

- track up option
- map following
- max zoom scale enough to see plane's position in space not wider than runway
- heading vector (or course) would be helpful to align plane with track
- option to import waypoints (manualy or by file)
- decent GPS refresh rate >1hz