The "Thin LiDAR Line of DEATH!!!"
Posted: Fri Mar 07, 2025 3:51 pm
I'm relatively new to CloudCompare.
I'm running CC 2.13.2 on a MacBook with Apple Silicon M1. Attachment 0 is a screenshot with more exact info on my build.
I've been successfully downloading .laz files from two sites: NOAA and USGS (see links below).
The .laz files from USGS load beautifully into CC but the files from NOAA result in the "Thin Line of Death" (Attachment 1).
There are multiple threads about this issue from others, and it seems from reading other threads that the NOAA files are doing this because of their spherical coordinates when CC wants cartesian coordinates. In Attachment 2 it looks to me like the X and Y are in degrees and Z is a length, which probably confirms the source of the problem.
I've tried a number of ways to convert the NOAA files into something that uses a cartesian CRM -- like converting to UTM in QGIS -- but nothing I've tried has worked.
In Attachment 3 and Attachment 4 I show the results of running two files (one from NOAA and the other from USGS) through LAStools lasinfo, in case that information might be helpful.
I would appreciate any advice on how I might go about fixing this problem?
Thanks,
Ken
USGS Site: https://apps.nationalmap.gov/lidar-explorer/#/
NOAA Site: https://coast.noaa.gov/dataviewer/#/lidar/search/
I'm running CC 2.13.2 on a MacBook with Apple Silicon M1. Attachment 0 is a screenshot with more exact info on my build.
- Attachment 0.jpg (31.51 KiB) Viewed 332 times
I've been successfully downloading .laz files from two sites: NOAA and USGS (see links below).
The .laz files from USGS load beautifully into CC but the files from NOAA result in the "Thin Line of Death" (Attachment 1).
- Attachment 1.jpg (41.55 KiB) Viewed 332 times
There are multiple threads about this issue from others, and it seems from reading other threads that the NOAA files are doing this because of their spherical coordinates when CC wants cartesian coordinates. In Attachment 2 it looks to me like the X and Y are in degrees and Z is a length, which probably confirms the source of the problem.
- Attachment 2.jpg (139.62 KiB) Viewed 332 times
I've tried a number of ways to convert the NOAA files into something that uses a cartesian CRM -- like converting to UTM in QGIS -- but nothing I've tried has worked.
In Attachment 3 and Attachment 4 I show the results of running two files (one from NOAA and the other from USGS) through LAStools lasinfo, in case that information might be helpful.
I would appreciate any advice on how I might go about fixing this problem?
Thanks,
Ken
USGS Site: https://apps.nationalmap.gov/lidar-explorer/#/
NOAA Site: https://coast.noaa.gov/dataviewer/#/lidar/search/