Breaking News | DJI Launches Its First High-Precision Aerial Survey LiDAR with Long Measurement Range, Fully Deploying in the High-End Aerial Survey Market

Text | Zhang Ziyi

Editor | Yuan Silai

DJI officially launched its first long-range, high-precision aerial survey lidar system - Zenmuse L3, which targets the high-end lidar market.

36Kr learned that DJI started researching core lidar components in 2016 and integrated lidar into drones in 2019. Leveraging its technological accumulation in drones, DJI has now iterated its Zenmuse series of aerial survey lidars to the third generation. The Zenmuse L3 achieves full-stack self - development of software and hardware and localization. Thanks to advantages such as technological self - development and global mass production, the starting price of the Zenmuse L3 is 109,080 yuan. In the past, the price of similar overseas products reached up to one million yuan.

The core advantage of the Zenmuse L3 lies in its 1535 - nanometer long - range lidar. Under a 10% reflectivity, the maximum range can reach 950 meters, and the point frequency can be flexibly adjusted up to 2 million points per second, greatly improving the hardware performance. At the same time, it is the world's first to integrate dual 100 - megapixel visible - light cameras, using a 4/3 CMOS sensor and a mechanical shutter. Combined with a high - precision attitude system and a three - axis gimbal, it brings higher efficiency in three - dimensional data collection.

In terms of efficiency, the breakthrough of the Zenmuse L3 is that its single - day operation area can reach 100 square kilometers. At a typical flight altitude of 300 meters, a single flight can cover 10 square kilometers, significantly expanding the coverage area of a single operation. In addition, the horizontal field of view of the dual 100 - megapixel cameras has been increased to 107°. High - overlap images can be collected with only a 20% laser side - overlap rate, greatly reducing the burden of repeated field data collection.

The line - following flight ability of the Zenmuse L3 has been significantly improved, with a maximum support for 130 - meter line - following operations. In most scenarios, it can obtain complete power corridor data in one go without detouring around intersections, enabling efficient straight - line flight. At the same time, on the basis of supporting the single - line repeated scanning and non - repeated scanning modes, the Zenmuse L3 has added a cross - shaped repeated scanning mode, which can balance accuracy and multiple emission angles, has strong penetration, is suitable for wooded areas or densely - built areas, and can more flexibly adapt to different operation requirements.

The Zenmuse L3 has achieved high standards in key accuracy indicators. Its self - developed lidar has a repeated ranging accuracy of less than 5 millimeters at 150 meters and an elevation accuracy of better than 3 centimeters at a flight altitude of 120 meters, making it capable of efficiently handling high - precision mapping projects such as 1:500 scale. This achievement is due to its smaller laser spot design, with a laser divergence angle of only 0.25 mrad, which means that at the same distance, its spot size is less than one - fifth of that of the Zenmuse L2. The smaller spot can better distinguish small targets such as wires, branches, and railway tracks, and can clearly and accurately restore details such as overhead lines even at a distance of 300 meters.

In addition, relying on DJI's self - owned software and hardware ecosystem, the Zenmuse L3 lidar system can provide a one - stop full - process solution from data collection, processing to application. Combined with DJI Terra and DJI Smart 3D Modeling, the Zenmuse L3 makes it easier to output results. Compared with the traditional multi - platform operation process, DJI's full - process solution is simple to operate and easy to learn, greatly reducing the user threshold and helping various industries efficiently complete various mapping tasks.

Zhang Xiaonan, the spokesperson of DJI, said: "In the future, the Zenmuse L3 will promote the penetration of high - end aerial survey lidars from a few professional fields to a wider range of industries and application scenarios, benefiting all walks of life such as power line inspection, forestry surveys, engineering construction, emergency rescue, and cultural heritage protection. To a certain extent, it will change the current global high - end aerial survey radar market pattern."