Use a mission area to define a processing extent in Site Scan

[dozer]

Overview 

Site Scan makes it easy to process most drone imagery without the need for much configuration. However, one highly requested input to processing is a mission area. The mission area is used to define the extent of your processed outputs, such as your ortho, DSM/DTM, point cloud, and mesh.  

Previously, Site Scan provided an optimized mission area when the boundary cropping option was selected.  

Now, you can view and configure the mission area before processing. In addition, you can create your own custom mission area which is especially useful for processing only a subset of your mission, or for creating outputs with an identical geographic extent for all missions in a project. 

View and edit your mission area 

All missions have a default area depending on where the mission was created: 

• Flight Plan area: if conducted in ArcGIS Flight 
• Area around the mission’s photos: if the mission was created manually in Site Scan 

To view your mission area, open the mission and enable the Mission Area layer in the sidebar. The polygon on the map represents the extent of what your processed outputs will be. If you want to modify the area, you have several options: 

• Edit 
• Set to Flight Plan (available if the mission was captured in ArcGIS Flight) 
• Set to Photos 

If you only want to make a few minor edits to the current polygon, click Edit. You can drag the polygon and modify the vertices to the desired extent. When you’re finished, click Save.

The Edit option is located in the Mission Area layer options (three dots next to the layer visibility toggle).

In this example, I adjusted the polygon's western edge to exclude the area over the coastal road.

Tip: to edit vertices, you first need to click on the polygon to expose the vertices for editing. Then, you can right click on vertices to delete them, drag existing ones to new locations, or add new ones. 

After you edit and save a new mission area, you can always return to the default mission area by clicking the mission area overflow dropdown and then Set to Photos (or Set to Flight Plan). 

When you are satisfied with the new mission area, open the processing menu in the lower left corner of the mission. Ensure the Mission Area setting is enabled and click Process Mission. 

Use a custom area 

In addition to using or modifying the existing optimized areas, you can create a custom area based on a polygon that you draw within the photo coverage area. Sometimes you may want to only map a small part or specific feature in your site. Another benefit to using a custom area is that you can use an identical area for multiple missions in your project. This is helpful when your project requires every mission to be the same size. 

These are the steps for creating and selecting a custom mission area. 

1. Create a volume measurement that encompasses the desired mission area. Choose the volume tool on the right sidebar, then draw your polygon. After you create the measurement, you can choose to rename it by opening the overflow menu for the measurement and choosing Rename. 
2. Pin the volume measurement to the project. Click the star icon to pin the to the project. Only volume measurements that have been pinned to the project can be selected as a mission area.
   A polygon now covers Building R on the eastern edge of the site. The measurement must be pinned to the project to select it as a mission area.
   
   
3. Select the pinned measurement as the mission area. Go back to the Layers tab. Click the overflow menu for the mission area layer and then pick your measurement under the Project Measurements section of the dropdown. 
   All volume measurements pinned to the project will appear here.
   
   
4. Save the mission area. Once you select your project measurement, you have another opportunity to make edits if needed. Once satisfied, click Save.
   The new polygon must be saved to use it as the mission area.
   
   

You are now ready to process. Click the process icon in the lower left corner, ensure that the Mission Area setting is enabled in the processing menu, then click Process Mission.

Mission Area setting must be enabled to process with the mission area polygon.

The resulting True Ortho matches the extent of the Building R polygon.

The same is true with all other data products, like the point cloud shown here.

A quick note on corridor and vertical scans that were created manually 

If your project contains corridor scans, vertical scans, and inspection missions that were created manually (not flown with ArcGIS Flight), the mission area feature is not enabled. Due to the unique nature of the image distributions and coverage area for these missions, the Photos mission area might not always be an accurate representation of the photo coverage area. By not adding the constraints of a mission area, it allows the Reality Engine to generate the outputs based on where results can be properly adjusted and reconstructed. 

We plan to offer the option to use a custom mission area for these missions soon.

What's next

The Site Scan product and development team looks forward to hearing any feedback about the mission area feature. You can post here in Esri Community or tell your customer success or account manager. In a future version, we will also allow you to define a waterbody mask to enhance results over water.