The FireflEYE 185 is a hyperspectral snapshot camera that takes the complete data cube within one blink of an eye. In sunny conditions the necessary integration time varies around 1ms. The 185 comes with 125 spectral bands covering 450-950 nm, and it weighs 490 g. This makes it most suitable to be used on UAVs. Together with cables and mini computer the payload is still less than 1kg. If attached with its customized two-axis gimbal the overall payload weight is 1.7 kg, allowing it to mount the camera on most of commercially available UAVs.
Camera Description
The FireflEYE 185 integrates two sensors:
- The spectral camera, resolution 50×50 pixel, 125 bands
- The panchromatic camera, resolution 1000×1000 pixel (1 MPixel), 1 band
The panchromatic camera is used to increase the spatial resolution of the camera, as it allows a pansharpening on the data, resulting in hyperspectral data cubes with a size of up to 1000x1000x125. As resampling methods you can choose nearest neighbor and bicubic.
Lens Options
We offer several lenses with different Field of View. Usually we recommend going for the 10mm (30° FOV) or 16mm (20°), because of the resulting larger area size per snapshot image.
The table gives an overview on the influence of lens/FOV and flight height to the spatial resolution of each pixel, for both camera sensors of the 185.
Image Acquisition
When programming your UAV with a waypoint mission consider enough overlap between the single snapshots (60-80% in both directions). This makes it easier to stitch the images to one hyperspectral mosaic. Together with the implemented GPS the panchromatic camera provides enough information for a stitching software such as Pix4D or Agisoft Photoscan to generate the mosaic. An additional IMU is not needed.
Furthermore, stitching the snapshot images not only provides a hyperspectral map, but also a orthomosaic and a Digital Surface Model as side products.
FireflEYE 185 Orthomosaic
FireflEYE 185 Digital Surface Model (DSM)
Flexibility in choosing the UAV Platform
The FireflEYE 185 is not bound to be used onboard a multicopter system, it can also be attached on a fixed wing system. The image below shows an example from an aerial survey in China taken with a FireflEYE 185, the image shows a hyperspectral NDVI.
- Platform: VTOL JOUAV CW-10 (hybrid UAV fixed wing / multicopter)
- Flight height: 180m
- Flight speed: 22-24 m/s
- Lens: 10mm
- Integration time: 3ms
- Overlap: 60%
- Overall file size: 30GB
- Stitching software: Agisoft Photoscan
