Tutorial #A8 – Sections and contour lines generation

Welcome to the 3DF Zephyr tutorials. In this recipe you willl learn how to automatically create sections, contour lines and track sections directly within 3DF Zephyr Aerial.

This tutorial requires 3DF Zephyr Aerial.

This tutorial uses an aerial dataset, however any dataset can be applied and used.

Download 3DF Zephyr Tutorial Dataset (643MB)

Step 1 – introduction

Contour Lines generation — click to view fullscreen

Thanks to the tools available in 3DF Zephyr Aerial, the sections and contour line generation can be done directly within Zephyr (manually or automatically) from the tools menu (1) in the submenu “sections and contour lines” (2) :

Single Section (3): requires a control point and a dense point cloud. Section dimensions and orientation are fully customizable.
Track Sections (4): requires a dense point cloud and a certain amount of control points. A certain amount of sections will be generated between a control point and the next. Section settings are customizable and common.
Contour lines (5): requires a dense point cloud. Sections dimensions will be suggested based on the bounding box dimensions. Section settings are customizable and common.

When the settings have been selected, a dedicated UI will be shown, common for all of the aforementioned actions: from this window you will be able to manually draw the section/contour line o let Zephyr automatically generate it for you (even for all the sections). Once generated, all the drawing elements can be exported in DXF or imported in the workspace.

Step 2A – single section generation

Pick a control point and pick single section (3) – a visual help will appear in overlay inside the workspace, along with a window that will allow you to pick the target point cloud and to change the section parameters.

When ready press OK and the section generation window will appear – go to step 3.

Step 2B – track sections

Track Sections in 3DF Zephyr Aerial — Click to view fullscreen

Pick certain control points along the track you wish to generate and pick track sections (4) – a visual help will appear in overlay inside the workspace, along with a window that will allow you to pick the target point cloud and to change the sections parameters, as well as picking the control points order and how many sections create between two control points.

When ready press OK and the section generation window will appear – go to step 3.

Step 2C – contour lines generation

Pick contour lines generation (5) – a visual help will appear in overlay inside the workspace, along with a window that will allow you to pick the target point cloud and to change the contour line generation parameters. Please note how the suggested dimensions depend on the bounding box settings.

When ready press OK and the section generation window will appear – go to step 3.

Step 3 – section/track section/contour lines actual generation

Automatic contour lines generation — Click to view fullscreen

Thanks to this inteface, common for all the aforementioned steps, you will be able to manually or automatically create the actual data you want:

Polyline management(6) – create or edit a polyline
Automatic generation (7) – automagically generate the current section or automagically create everything
Cycle section (8) – cycle between sections
Export/Import (9) – export the DXF and import the drawing elements inside the Zephyr workspace
Rotate (10) – rotate the current section to ease the polyline generation task.
Zoom (11) – zoom the current section to ease the polyline generation task.(also possible via mousewheel)
Reset (12) – reset the current zoom and rotation

When generated, the drawing elements may be exported to DXF or imported inside the Zephyr Workspace.

Final notes

All these operations are very similar: learn to use the automagic generation (7) as soon as you since it can really cut the time you need to work a lot. Please also not how the drawing elements are manageable from the “Drawing elements” panel.

The next tutorial will show the shape from silhouette feature. Proceed to the next tutorial.