24 Oct First flight of the PANOPTE mutispectral camera

Once concluded the manufacturing, integration and on-ground calibration phases of the development of the multispectral camera PANOPTE, the ARGOS UAV take off the Moia testing runaway on October 19th 2008 to perform the first evaluation flight of the camera. It is embeded in a wing that is attached to the UAV platform. During the 30 minutes flight, the correct operation of the onboard systems and the excellent aerodynamic behavior that the camara adds to the platform performances were assessed. Several images were captured around the testing runaway to analize the camera performances. The first test results are very promissing. The aerodynamic structure of the camera contributes to the platform stability and the images were captured as expected. At present, the effects of the UAV platform on the mechanical estability of the camera during the image capture are been analysed to define the real in-flight camera performances.
PANOPTE will provide images in six spectral bands of 50 and 80 nm bandwidth in the 400-1000 nm spectral range. With this camera, CATUAV will be able to perform thematic studies at spatial and temporal resolution ranges inaccessible by other systems. Due to that the six bands can be configured, the camera can be adapted to each application (see image). Thus, it will be possible to carry out quatitative analysis oriented to hidrology, forestry, agriculture, geology, pollution and waste management.