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USA Mapping Training

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I see that DART DRONES is offering a course for a Drone Deploy workshop for $1,490. I want to know from Professional Mappers out there if this is a course they would recommend or if not what would you recommend? I need to find work for my Inspire 2 and Believer with a Sony a6000. So I thought mapping would be good to get into as I have used Drone Deploy before and enjoyed the process. I need to be able to get clients for the service and thought of networking at the Dart Drone Course
 
I see that DART DRONES is offering a course for a Drone Deploy workshop for $1,490. I want to know from Professional Mappers out there if this is a course they would recommend or if not what would you recommend? I need to find work for my Inspire 2 and Believer with a Sony a6000. So I thought mapping would be good to get into as I have used Drone Deploy before and enjoyed the process. I need to be able to get clients for the service and thought of networking at the Dart Drone Course

Some of the community colleges are starting to offer UAV programs that will get your feet wet. That will give you an understanding of coordinates, projection systems, some GIS and/or CAD and maybe even some imagery processing software.
 
I see that DART DRONES is offering a course for a Drone Deploy workshop for $1,490. I want to know from Professional Mappers out there if this is a course they would recommend or if not what would you recommend?

That seems awfully spendy for something I taught myself. I would take that money and purchase a P4P. I'll tell you why in a minute.





I need to find work for my Inspire 2 and Believer with a Sony a6000.

That's WAY too much drone for mapping. If you get a 800 acre job, you'll be flying all day back-to-back missions for 8 hours. Do you have that many batteries? I find that with 7 batteries and a 3-battery charger (100+ watts per battery), I can stay aloft perpetually. But that's with a P4P. The flight time with a Inspire 2 with an A6000 is going to be either significantly less, OR the batteries are going to take a lot longer to charge due to their higher capacity.

If the course is worth a salt, the first thing they're going to tell you is to dump that I2 and trade it in for a P4P. The P4P has a mechanical shutter, which is a deal-maker in the mapping game. Plus you don't want to have $10,000 flying 2 miles out to get photos. God forbid something should happen to the drone, that's a LOT of money down the toilet. I imagine the A6000 has a mechanical shutter, as well, yes?




So I thought mapping would be good to get into as I have used Drone Deploy before and enjoyed the process.

Is Drone Deploy terrain aware? If not, that's the wrong program. Are you working with a survey company? If not, you may run into legal troubles if you use the word "map." There's TONS of stuff to know that I wonder if this school is going to teach you all this??



I need to be able to get clients for the service and thought of networking at the Dart Drone Course

I can't say either way. But I can tell you this. Any company that focuses on the drone and the software are giving you only 25% of the picture at best. My HIGHEST recommendation is to shop yourself to survey companies. The work-flow with them is pretty straight forward.

* Receive .kml file of the area with pinpoints where the GCP's are going to lay out.
* Coordinate shoot time/date on a day that they can lay out GCP's.
* Make sure weather permits.
* Get GSD spec's (1 inch/pixel is pretty standard).
* Get overlap spec's (75/75 is pretty standard).
* Send a screen shot of your mapping mission for final approval.
* Meet the surveyor on site and fly your mission(s).
* Deliver photos to surveyor for rendering orthophoto map.
* Make sure to cache maps before leaving your house (Internet access) (some sites are out of cell range, so don't count on hot spot).
* Make sure your drone is unimpeded by random, erroneous DJI "tests" and/or "EULA agreements." If you're not VERY DILIGENT, this crap WILL bite you in the field.

I've spent a couple years getting the work flow down.

Good luck!

D
 
Don't waste your money. If you don't have Drone Deploy, get it and it is easy to learn. There support is also very good. I do mapping with DD at least once a week. As for the GCP's they normally give those to you in a Excel spread sheet.
As I'm sure your aware of the flights are completely autonomous.

If you need any help, PM me, my advice is free, right or wrong.
 
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P4P is best option for mapping. Then use Drone Deploy or Maps Made Easy

Is Drone Deploy terrain aware? Map Pilot is, which is why I use it. But I'm open to trying other mapping software if it employs terrain awareness.

D
 

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