Surveys
Creating Surveys
Surveys in SiteView represent a single drone flight or data capture event on a construction site. Each survey contains up to three output types — an orthophoto, a point cloud, and a DEM — that are displayed on the CesiumJS 3D globe. This page covers creating, editing, and deleting surveys.
What Is a Survey?
A survey is a record of a drone capture session at a specific point in time. It acts as a container for the processed outputs from that session:
| Output | Description |
|---|---|
| Orthophoto | A geo-referenced aerial image stitched from overlapping drone photos, displayed as a 2D overlay on the globe |
| Point Cloud | A dense set of 3D points representing the site surface, displayed as a 3D tileset on the globe |
| DEM | A Digital Elevation Model — a height grid used by measurement tools for elevation, volume, and gradient calculations |
A survey does not need all three outputs. You might upload only an orthophoto, or only a point cloud, depending on what your photogrammetry software produced.
Creating a New Survey
To create a survey, open a site and navigate to the Surveys tab in the floating panel. Click the New Survey button (or use the quick action on the Overview tab).
Fill in the survey details:
- Name (required) — a descriptive name for the survey (e.g., "Site Capture — March 2026", "Pad Level Check")
- Date (required) — the date the drone capture was performed
![[Screenshot: Create Survey modal with name and date fields, and a Create button]](/images/placeholder.png)
After creating the survey, it appears in the Surveys tab with a Pending status. The next step is to add data — either by processing raw drone images or importing pre-processed files.
Survey Status Lifecycle
Each survey moves through a status lifecycle as data is added and processed:
Pending → Uploading → Processing → Completed
→ Failed
| Status | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Pending | Survey created but no data has been uploaded yet |
| Uploading | Files are being uploaded to the server |
| Processing | Data is being processed (tile generation, 3D tile conversion, or NodeODM processing) |
| Completed | Processing finished successfully — outputs are ready to view on the globe |
| Failed | Processing encountered an error — check the error message for details |
ℹ️ Did you know?
The status updates automatically as you upload and process data. You do not need to change the status manually — the system tracks it through the pipeline.
Failed Surveys
If a survey enters the Failed state, the error message provides details about what went wrong. Common causes include:
- Corrupt or unsupported file formats
- Insufficient drone image overlap for NodeODM processing
- Missing coordinate reference system in uploaded GeoTIFFs
You can retry the upload or processing after addressing the issue. The survey does not need to be recreated — re-upload the corrected files to the same survey.
What a Survey Contains
Once completed, a survey card in the Surveys tab shows which outputs are available with status indicators:
- A green indicator for outputs that are available and ready to display
- A grey indicator for outputs that were not uploaded for this survey
Click on a completed survey to expand its details and access individual layer controls. Each available output can be toggled on or off in the Layers tab.
💡 Tip
Name your surveys with dates and a brief descriptor so they are easy to identify when you have multiple surveys on one site. For example, "2026-03-15 — Bulk Earthworks" is clearer than "Survey 3".
Editing a Survey
To edit a survey's name or date, click the edit button on the survey card in the Surveys tab. The edit modal lets you update:
- Name — update the display name
- Date — correct the capture date if entered incorrectly
Editing a survey's metadata does not affect the uploaded data or processing status.
Deleting a Survey
To delete a survey, click the delete button on the survey card. Deleting a survey permanently removes:
- The survey record
- All uploaded files (orthophoto, point cloud, DEM)
- All processed tiles and 3D tilesets
- Any measurements that reference this survey's data
⚠️ Watch out!
Survey deletion is permanent and cannot be undone. If measurements were taken using this survey's DEM or point cloud, those measurements will also be removed. Confirm you no longer need the data before deleting.
Next Steps — Adding Data
After creating a survey, you need to add data to it. There are two approaches:
- Drone Image Processing — upload raw drone images and let SiteView's NodeODM integration process them into orthophotos, point clouds, and DEMs
- Importing Processed Data — upload pre-processed files from Pix4D, DroneDeploy, Agisoft Metashape, or other photogrammetry software
What's Next?
- Drone Image Processing — process raw drone images within SiteView
- Importing Processed Data — upload ready-to-use orthophotos, DEMs, and point clouds
- Survey Layers & Overlays — control visibility and opacity of survey outputs on the globe