Dense 3D Model Generation of a Dam Surface Using UAV for Visual Inspection

In recent years the term “industry 4.0” has been consolidated, indicating a trend towards the automation of industrial processes with the introduction of new technologies to support the production of goods and services. Connected to this new type of industry, in this paper, the authors describe the implementation of a solution based on the automatic analysis of data extracted from a photogrammetric survey. In particular, a low-cost UAV system has been used and, in this paper, all the analyses involved in the planning of the data acquisition phase, their management and processing within a GIS system are described. During the acquisition phase, different data sets were acquired using different techniques, recording 4 k video and acquiring high resolution images. The place chosen to perform this test was the Serrù dam, a plant located in Ceresole Reale, near Turin, Piedmont (Italy). A 3D model was made of this structure on which a wall integrity check was carried out.