FPCFilter (Fast Point Cloud Filtering)

FPCFilter performs 3 types of processes: Crop, Sample and Filter.

Here are the input parameters:

  -i, --input arg        Input point cloud
  -o, --output arg       Output point cloud
  -b, --boundary arg     Crop boundary (GeoJSON POLYGON)
  -s, --std arg          Standard deviation threshold
  -m, --meank arg        Mean number of neighbors
  -r, --radius arg       Sample radius
  -c, --concurrency arg  Max concurrency
  -v, --verbose          Verbose output

The relevant parameters for each process are:

• Crop: -b, --boundary
• Sample: -r, --radius
• Filter: -s, --std and -m, --meank

The programs works like a PDAL pipeline:

load -> crop -> sample -> filter -> write

It will skip the stages not requested by the user

See PDAL documentation for more details:

• Crop: http://pdal.io/stages/filters.crop.html#filters-crop
• Sample: http://pdal.io/stages/filters.sample.html#filters-sample
• Filter: http://pdal.io/stages/filters.outlier.html#statistical-method

---

It supports PLY point clouds in the following formats:

binary little endian with header:

property float32 x
property float32 y
property float32 z
property uint8 red
property uint8 green
property uint8 blue
property float32 nx
property float32 ny
property float32 nz
property uint8 views
end_header

and ascii with header

property float x
property float y
property float z
property uchar diffuse_red
property uchar diffuse_green
property uchar diffuse_blue
property uchar views
end_header

FPCFilter outputs a binary little endian PLY with the following header if the source has the normals (nx, ny, nz):

property float x
property float y
property float z
property float nx
property float ny
property float nz			
property uchar red
property uchar blue
property uchar green
property uchar views
end_header

without nx, ny and nz if the source file has not got them.

---

Building

Requirements:

• OpenMP
• cmake
• g++

git clone https://github.com/OpenDroneMap/FPCFilter.git
cd FPCFilter
mkdir build && cd build
cmake -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release .. && make -j$(nproc)

On Windows you should install Visual Studio (the free Community Edition works great), Git and CMake. Then:

git clone https://github.com/OpenDroneMap/FPCFilter.git
cd FPCFilter
md build && cd build
cmake ..
cmake --build . --config Release --target ALL_BUILD -- /maxcpucount:14

In order to build the tests call cmake with -DBUILD_TESTING=1 and -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Debug

Docker

Build the image with:

docker build . -t opendronemap/fpcfilter

Run the container with:

docker run -it -v "${PWD}":/data --rm opendronemap/fpcfilter -i /data/input.ply -o /data/out.ply

PWD is the current directory, change it accordingly to your needs.

Use the image as the executable itself, call it without parameters to see the help.