Workflow
Drone Surveying That Holds Up to Checking
A drone survey replaces days of walking with an hour of flying — if the positioning holds up. The difference between a pretty map and a defensible one is ground truth: RTK corrections during flight, ground control you can re-occupy, and photogrammetry that reports its residuals. That is the whole stack we build and sell.
The Method
Three steps to survey-grade output
1
Control on the ground
A RoboDot Touch base station on a known or OPUS-derived point (docs.robota.us covers base setup), with stencil-marked ground control points across the site.
RTK receivers →2
Corrections to the drone
RTK corrections stream to the aircraft over NTRIP, so every image is tagged with centimeter coordinates as it is captured.
Base station setup →3
Process to deliverables
Photogrammetry turns the flight into orthomosaics, surfaces, contours, and volumes — checked against your GCPs.
Drone mapping software →The Kit
What a drone surveying kit actually needs
RoboDot Touch
Base, rover, and logger in one — the ground-truth anchor for the whole survey. $1,875.
GCP Stencil
Paint repeatable ground control targets that align exactly with the receiver.
Metashape Pro
Photogrammetry processing to orthomosaics, DEMs, contours, and volumes.
RoboNet VRS
Skip owning a base: survey-grade network corrections from $14.99/month.
Go Deeper
Field guides on drone surveying
Drone vs traditional surveying
Cost, accuracy, and where each wins — with real numbers.
Ground control points, properly
How GCPs are placed, measured, and used to prove your map.
Construction & engineering
Progress tracking, stockpiles, and as-builts on active sites.