Course content

• Different types of terrestrial laser scanners (TLS)
• Different types of mobile terrestrial laser scanners (MTLS)
• Different types of airborne laser scanners (ALS)
• TLS instruments' components and mode of operation
• Data acquisition with TLS instruments
• Handling point clouds
• Commonly used data formats
• Point cloud registration and georeferencing
• Reporting and documentation of fieldwork and post-processing
• General feature extraction and basic 3D modeling from point clouds
• Scan to BIM workflow

Learning outcome

By the end of this course students will gain the following knowledge which are the fundamentals of digitalization in construction business:

• Fundamentals of the scanning mechanism of the latest TLS instruments
• Carry out terrestrial laser scanning including registration and georeferencing of the dataset
• Statistical methods for quality analysis of an acquired dataset.

By the end of the course students will gain the following skills:

• Setting up, operating and calibrating TLS instruments
• Matching overlapping scanned datasets (registration and georeferencing)
• Basics of feature extraction and 3D modeling based on pointclouds
• Detection of systematic and gross error in the dataset; statistical analysis and tests against given criteria

Learning methods and activities

• Lectures
• Project work
• Supervision

The course can be given as a guided self-study if less than 6 students are registered.

Compulsory assignments

• Compulsory assignment

Further on evaluation

There will be 4 assignments to be turned in. Some will be handed in as groupwork, while others as individual work. All assignments must be passed.

The evaluation is based on oral exam (100%), with a specific focus on the student's ability to present and explain the method used for his/her projects, including explaining the theoretical underpinnings. A detailed description of the requirements for choosing a project will be given at the start of the course. A project description must be approved by the instructor before work gets underway.

A re-sit examination is held in March.

Specific conditions

Required previous knowledge

• GEOM1130 Geomatics
• GEOM1210 Land surveying calculations
• GEOM1320 Advanced surveying

Course materials

There is no obligatory textbook. Suggested reading list:

• Topographic Laser Ranging and Scanning, Principles and Processing, Seconf Edition, Edited by Jie Shan and Charles K. Toth, 2018, ISBN: 978-1-4987-7227-3
• Instrument and software manuals (regularly updated on the relevant website or in help menu)
• Handout materials (Blackboard)

Material in Norwegian (non-Norwegian-speaking students will get help in translation from the instructor):

• Skogseth, T. (2014). Grunnleggende landmåling. Oslo: Universitetsforlaget (ISBN: 978-82-05-44934-3). (in Norwegian)