Velodyne Lidar has entered into an agreement to provide its Puck LITE LiDAR sensors to Emesent, developers of the Hovermap mobile scanning system for mapping hazardous and GPS-denied environments. Hovermap can be hand-held or mounted to a drone, and combines advanced collision avoidance and autonomous flight technologies to perform high-accuracy mapping in a wide range of environments, including challenging indoor and underground areas.
The Puck LITE is Hovermap’s primary perception and mapping sensor. The unit’s low weight and small size make it ideal for use in SWaP (size, weight and power)-constrained applications such as UAVs (unmanned aerial vehicles). It provides a full 360-degree environmental view and delivers real-time 3D data in high resolution.
Hovermap provides high-quality data capture for the mining, construction/infrastructure, forestry, defense, oil and gas, and film industries. The system features 3D point cloud colorization that provides additional context for visualization and analysis.
Daniel Thomas of drone cinematography provider XM2 commented: “When operating on a live set to capture VFX data in the film industry, speed is key. We use the Hovermap now to cover areas that traditionally had no effective lidar capture method, including above buildings and around complex set pieces, in a fraction of the time a terrestrial lidar takes. We can now operate between takes, capturing areas that would normally take an hour in five minutes.”
Dr. Stefan Hrabar, CEO of Emesent, said: “The Velodyne Puck LITE lidar is an extraordinary sensor for mobile mapping systems due to its compact size, light weight and high performance. The sensor helped us create game-changing technology that can obtain vital data in challenging environments in real time without risking the machine or operator safety.”
Anand Gopalan, CEO of Velodyne Lidar, added: “Emesent’s inventive use of Velodyne’s lidar sensors is enabling rapid autonomous mobile scanning that safely delivers operational insights in a range of applications. Hovermap provides an excellent showcase of how Puck LITE’s 360-degree capture capability enables companies to produce high quality, accurate, georeferenced point cloud data.”
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