images have no spatial reference?

Phil Crossley · Jun 9, 2020

Hi. I'm trying to learn to use my P4Adv with Drone Deploy (and other apps) for mapping missions. In my most recent attempts, when I examine any of the photos (.jpg) in ArcGIS, they show as "unknown coordinate system", which doesn't make sense since the AC obviously had good positioning while it was carrying out the mission. When I create an orthomosaic in ArcGIS Pro, they end up in the correct location, so the correct spatial reference is 'in there' somewhere, but not in a way that ArcCatalog-Properties-Source can 'find'.... Is this because they are jpgs without a .prj file? I don't see anywhere in Drone Deploy (although I've only had the free trial version) to set any spatial reference. Any advice from you experts?

Meta4 · Jun 9, 2020

Phil Crossley said:
Hi. I'm trying to learn to use my P4Adv with Drone Deploy (and other apps) for mapping missions. In my most recent attempts, when I examine any of the photos (.jpg) in ArcGIS, they show as "unknown coordinate system", which doesn't make sense since the AC obviously had good positioning while it was carrying out the mission. When I create an orthomosaic in ArcGIS Pro, they end up in the correct location, so the correct spatial reference is 'in there' somewhere, but not in a way that ArcCatalog-Properties-Source can 'find'.... Is this because they are jpgs without a .prj file? I don't see anywhere in Drone Deploy (although I've only had the free trial version) to set any spatial reference. Any advice from you experts?

It would be very unusual if your images don't have any location data.
The jpg files have the data inside the jpg in the exif info.

R Martin · Jun 25, 2020

Phil Crossley said:
Hi. I'm trying to learn to use my P4Adv with Drone Deploy (and other apps) for mapping missions. In my most recent attempts, when I examine any of the photos (.jpg) in ArcGIS, they show as "unknown coordinate system", which doesn't make sense since the AC obviously had good positioning while it was carrying out the mission. When I create an orthomosaic in ArcGIS Pro, they end up in the correct location, so the correct spatial reference is 'in there' somewhere, but not in a way that ArcCatalog-Properties-Source can 'find'.... Is this because they are jpgs without a .prj file? I don't see anywhere in Drone Deploy (although I've only had the free trial version) to set any spatial reference. Any advice from you experts?

Phil,

Each image taken records the geoinformation (X,Y&Z) in the metadata of the image but has to be post-processed via ArcGIS or Pix4D, for example and converted into an orthomosaic before it will seamlessly drop into your file geodatabase. At least the info is written to the images individually and has to be teased out. My big drone generates a separate file and I have to manually write the information to each image, provided that the image count is exactly the same; otherwise, wasted time and flight.