Use inspection tools

The Drone2Map inspection workflow provides inspection tools to review drone imagery, quickly find and document areas of interest, and report those findings for in-field resolution.

Create an inspection session

To use the inspection tools, an inspection session first must be created. This is similar to an edit session, and only one inspection session can be created per project.

To create an inspection session, complete the following steps:

  1. With a project open and at least one product present, click the Analysis tab.
  2. In the Tools group, click the Inspection button Image Inspection.

    The Inspection tab appears.

  3. Click the New Inspection button New Image Inspection.

    The Inspection Editor pane appears.

  4. Click Create to create an inspection schema. Alternatively, click Import to import an existing feature class or inspection schema.

    The fields section appears with a preconfigured schema or your imported schema.

  5. Optionally, modify the existing schema field names and field types.
  6. Click the Add Field button to add a new field.
  7. If the field is defined as an integer, click the Manage Domain button Manage Domain.

    The Manage Domain window appears.

  8. Modify any existing domains if you modified the Severity field in step 5 above.
  9. Click the New Entry button to add a new domain.

    Colors can be specified for each entry. When drawing features, if you use a field entry that has an associated color, the inspection feature will also be that color.

  10. Click OK to close the Manage Domain window.
  11. Click Create to create the inspection session.

    The Inspection Editor pane changes to its feature editing functionality and the Inspection Viewer window appears.

Create an inspection feature

The Inspection Editor pane provides editing tools to create point, line, and polygon inspection features with user-defined attributes describing the features. Additionally, measurement tools allow you to measure height, distance, and area of features in drone imagery.

To create an inspection feature, complete the following steps:

  1. On the Inspection tab, click the Inspection Editor button.

    The Inspection Editor pane appears.

  2. On the Inspection tab, click the Inspection Viewer button.

    The Inspection Viewer window appears .In this window, the project images appear as a gallery.

  3. Locate and click an image that clearly depicts the object that needs an inspection feature.

    The image appears in the Inspection Viewer window.

  4. Click and drag the image or zoom in with the scroll wheel. Optionally, use the Zoom In Zoom In and Zoom Out Zoom Out buttons.

    If the image is not visually clear enough, click the Display Settings button Display Settings to adjust it. You can adjust brightness, contrast, and gamma, and apply a dynamic range adjustment. You can also turn off or on the sketched inspection feature using the Display Sketch toggle button Display Sketch.

  5. Use the buttons at the top of the Inspection Editor pane to choose a feature type.
  6. Draw the feature in the Inspection Viewer window.

    If a domain field is present in the schema and the entries are color coded, the inspection feature will appear in that color.

  7. Click the Create Snapshot button Create Snapshot to attach the image as a snapshot to the inspection feature.

    An include icon appears on the snapshot in the image gallery. Now, every time you open this inspection feature, the snapshot will open in the image gallery.

  8. In the gallery, choose another image by clicking its thumbnail.

    The inspection feature that was drawn appears in the Inspection Viewer window overlayed on the full-resolution image. Clicking the Image Information button Image Information will display details about the current inspection viewer image and open it outside of Drone2Map.

  9. Optionally, create additional snapshots to be associated with the inspection feature.
  10. In the Inspection Editor pane, provide a name for the feature.
  11. Fill in any other fields that were provided when setting up the inspection.

    Any fields that have a populated domain appear with a drop-down menu.

  12. Click Create to create the inspection feature.

    A message appears indicating that the inspection was created.

  13. To see the newly drawn feature on both the map and Inspection Viewer click the Sync Views button Sync Views.

Filter inspection gallery images

When creating inspection features and using the Inspection Viewer window, you can filter the images that appear in the image gallery to be more relevant to a specific location.

To filter the images that appear in the image gallery, complete the following steps:

  1. On the Inspection tab, in the Inspect group, click the Filter By Point button Filter by Map Point.

    The pointer changes to crosshairs.

  2. In either the 2D or 3D map, click the location where you want to filter images.

    The image gallery filters images based on the clicked point, and new filtering options appear below the image window.

    Five images are returned by default when you use the Filter By Point button.

  3. To see more images based on the filtered point, click the Load More button, or click the Load All button to see all images in the project.
  4. To clear the active filter, click the X on the map filter button under the main image window.
  5. Click the drop-down arrow next to the Filter button Filter, and check the Inspected or Not Inspected check box to filter the images that have or have not been inspected in the image gallery.

Open inspection features from a 2D or 3D Map

Inspection features can be opened from the 2D or 3D map to be reviewed and edited. The snapshots that are included with an inspection feature appear in the image gallery when the inspection feature is opened.

To open an inspection feature from the map, complete the following steps:

  1. On the Inspection tab, in the Selection group, click the Select button.
  2. Using the select tool, select an inspection feature in the 2D or 3D map.
  3. On the Inspection tab, in the Inspect group, click the Open Selected button Open Selected Inspection.

    The Inspection Viewer window appears and the gallery displays all the snapshots that were selected to be included with the inspection feature.

Open inspection features from the inspection table

Inspection features can be opened from the inspection table to be reviewed and edited. The snapshots that are included with an inspection feature appear in the image gallery when the inspection feature is opened.

To open an inspection feature from the inspection table, complete the following steps:

  1. On the Inspection tab, in the Inspect group, click the Inspection Table button Inspection Table.

    The inspection table appears and displays a list of the recorded inspection features.

  2. Click a row in the table to select an inspection feature.
  3. Click the Open button in the table to open the inspection feature.

    The Inspection Viewer window appears and the gallery displays all the snapshots that were selected to be included with the inspection feature.

View the inspection report

The inspection report can be generated at any time during or after an inspection and is updated automatically when new inspection features are created during the inspection session.

To view the inspection report for an active inspection session, complete the following steps:

  1. On the Inspection tab, in the Manage group, click the Inspection Report button Inspection Report.

    The inspection report is generated and appears in a new window.

  2. Review the inspection report and use the links in the Table of Contents section to find inspection features by name.

Customize the inspection

Additional options for customizing inspection reports, symbology, and inspection data are available through the Inspection Properties button Inspection Options on the Inspection tab. To learn more about the available options, see Inspection properties.

Keyboard shortcuts

You can use keyboard shortcuts for certain actions when performing an inspection. The following table lists the available shortcuts for the Inspection Editor pane and Inspection Viewer along with their function:

Keyboard shortcutFunction

Alt + I

Mark the current image as inspected.

Alt + P

Create a snapshot for the current image.

Alt + ,

Go back to the previous image in the image gallery.

Alt + .

Advance to the next image in the image gallery.

Alt + M

Create an inspection feature (at least one snapshot is required).

Ctrl + left click on a thumbnail in the image gallery

Mark the selected image as inspected.