Web-Based LiDAR Visualization with Point-Based Rendering

The usage of LiDAR (Light Detection And Ranging) technology has been steadily increasing in recent years, creating large amounts of terrain data using terrestrial, airborne and satellite LiDAR scanning. The biggest problems encountered are large storage requirements, lesser transportability due to file sizes and real-time visualization of produced points, which reach numbers even up to a billion for some scans. With typical broadband Internet connections already offering speeds above 10 Mbps, remote storage and visualization is becoming a reasonable option for LiDAR use. In this paper we propose a two part solution. Firstly, web-based distribution of LiDAR data solves the transportability issues by storing all point data on a server and organizing it into a data structure which enables quick handling of range and level-of-detail queries from a remote client. Secondly, the client designed to connect to this server uses advanced point-based rendering for high quality display of transferred data.