Let the computation begin Now that we have taken over 2,000 photos of Tasman Glacier, it’s time to use them to produce the DEM of the glacier. There are a few different softwares out there that combine photos into three-dimensional models, but we’re presently using AgiSoft PhotoScan Pro. With only one laptop cranking away, theRead more
RV Jet up! After we had a beer to mourn the loss of our Sky Hunter, we re-grouped and pulled out Brian’s drone, an RV Jet. We had previously tried to autopilot the RV Jet, but were having some trouble connecting it to the ground station, so we weren’t sure if it would be possibleRead more
Tasman Glacier survey completed After nine separate drone flights (not including the one that led to the loss of Sky Hunter), we successfully surveyed the lower portion of Tasman Glacier! The blue dots in the image below show the locations of all of our camera shots — a total of 2,735 in-flight photos. To giveRead more
Sky Hunter down Karen putting together the tail of the Sky Hunter before its first flight of the day. Our second day flying over Tasman Glacier was, unfortunately, not as successful as our first. We moved our ground control site a few kilometers downglacier, with the goal of finishing surveying the glacier with 3 moreRead more
100km of across-glacier flights completed! We completed our first flights over Tasman Glacier today! Our launch and landing site was about an hour hike past the end of the road — a walk made slightly more challenging by the fact that we were carrying all of our gear on our backs. But once we arrived,Read more
Successful test flights Brian Anderson taking the RV Jet for a spin. After a day of torrential rains — apparently atypical for Mackenzie country — we were treated to a beautiful day today that allowed us to complete all of our test flights. We wanted to ensure that the drones could all pass a handfulRead more
The drones have landed — in New Zealand Our vehicles in the background after arriving at our launch test site. We’ve already had two successful days in New Zealand prepping for the campaign. Despite the impending threat of a tropical cyclone, the weather yesterday was mild enough to do some test launches and flights in the glacialRead more
Dispatch from SFO The Agribotix glacier monitoring team is en route to New Zealand for a field campaign that is cooler — literally — than agricultural monitoring. Upon arriving in Christchurch on Saturday morning, we’ll be heading straight to Tasman Glacier with two drones and a few cameras in tow. There, we’ll spend up toRead more
Agribotix wins the Cleantech Track of the University of Colorado New Venture Challenge From left to right: Tom McKinnon, Paul Hoff, Wayne Greenberg, Daniel McKinnon, Phil Calabrese, and Steve Berens, one of the judges Last night Agribotix competed in the finals of the Cleantech Track in the CU New Venture Challenge. Eight excellent teams wereRead more
Agribotix gets ready for a trip to New Zealand Agribotix has been commissioned to travel to New Zealand to use the accurate Digital Elevation Models we generate to help with a scientific study of glacier movement. This mission will require different instruments and aeronautics than typically used in agriculture, so we spent a nice dayRead more
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