Evaluating the Accuracy of UAV and TLS for 3D Indoor Modelling in Large-Scale Building Environments

The accuracy of 3D indoor reconstructed models is critical in various applications such as indoor navigation, virtual reality (VR), and building information modelling (BIM). This research study aims to evaluate the accuracy of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV) and Terrestrial Laser Scanning (TLS) for 3D indoor modelling in large-scale building environments. To achieve this, several evaluations were made towards the number of point clouds, estimated costs and accuracy of the 3D indoor reconstructed model generated from dense point clouds acquired by Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) and Terrestrial Laser Scanner (TLS). A small indoor classroom was selected for this study approximately 100m². In UAV data acquisition, three (3) flight missions were set up at the front, left and right views. Meanwhile, five (5) scanning stations were placed on-site for the TLS method. Due to various different flight mission views in the UAV dataset, the number of point clouds was quite higher compared to the TLS method. However, a better-quality visualization of the TLS model has been obtained as opposed to the UAV 3D model. For the required time to generate a 3D model, it showed that UAV processing time was more consuming lots of time than the TLS method, especially when georeferencing the overlapping photographs. In terms of accuracy, the RMSE value from TLS was better than UAV at 0.003m compared to UAV at 0.021m. Overall, this study provides insights into the accuracy and suitability of UAV and TLS for 3D indoor modelling in large-scale building environments. The results can inform decision-making processes in various industries such as architecture, engineering, and construction, where accurate and reliable 3D models are crucial for design, planning, and management purposes.