Unoccupied aerial vehicles (UAV) are increasingly being used as a tool for retrieving environmental and geospatial data. The scientific applications include mapping and measuring tasks, such as surveying ecosystems and monitoring wildlife as well as more complex parameter retrieval, for example flow velocity measurements in rivers or products derived from UAV based Lidar measurements. Hence, UAVs are used to collect data across many environmental science disciplines, land management and also for commercial applications. Depending on the use and research question, different sensors are mounted on the UAV and areas of interest (AOI) of varying coverage and a diverse range of timeframes of interest (TOI) are captured during surveying flights. For that reason, the resulting datasets are very heterogeneous and in joint research projects even dispersed over a number of institutions and research groups. While the outcomes of the analyses are published in the relevant journals of the respective disciplines, the underlying raw data are rarely publicly accessible, despite often being publicly funded. Although the high spatial resolution of UAV-derived information can help to close the scale-gap between ground observations and large-scale observations provided by the Sentinels, UAV data cannot yet be explored jointly together with Sentinel data at large scales because UAV data is not systematically catalogued and stored.
For reuse and valorisation of already existing datasets, as well as the planning of further research projects it would be useful for scientists to be able to find the before mentioned UAV data. Pivotal for developing any project in an area under investigation are questions as to whether data exist for the area, if they are available for further use, and which data products already have been generated from that data.
Here, we aim to solve these issues by developing and testing a data platform that to facilitate the exchange of UAV images and data between projects and institutions. The Open Drone Portal (OpenDroP) is a data model with a web application that serves as a data catalogue for the registration of UAV images that includes mandatory criteria such as product type, AOI and TOI. In addition, it is also possible to record additional, UAV-specific metadata, such as the UAV platform, the mounted sensor model and type or detailed georeferencing information. This kind of metadata does not appear in other common search solutions and catalogue standards. To facilitate finding data in OpenDroP by thematic focus, the referenced records can be tagged by the user.
If the scientific evaluation of the data has already been published, the publication data can be supplemented to show how the data has been transferred into domain-specific products. If only metadata is provided in the database users have the possibility to contact the data provider. However, during the creation of the database entry, users can also provide a download link and indicate under which licence the data may be used.
The application will be accessible to all users. A first demonstrator application offers the possibility to test research and publication functions based on freely available data (https://opendrop.de/application).