Trying sort out Lidar Data I took

[KevinChambers]

Hi Everyone,

I have a lidar device with the purpose designed to go down various holes to create a 3D image. X is the position of the rotation, where Y is the distance measured from the lidar unit, and Z is the height. All data is saved into a text file to import to ARCMAP. After which the plan is to convert to a layer package, to a las, to raster. However, when I import the file, I get the attached image, you can also see the excel spreadsheet, which was saved as a .txt

Few questions that I need help with, is there a better way to create a 3D image / better process? Why is the data when importing into ARCMAP displaying the way it is, when it at least should be a flat cylinder? When I created fake data before, it showed as a flat cylinder.

[XanderBakker]

Remember that X and Y in your case do not represent "X" and "Y". The angle of rotation/bearing (X) and distance (Y) can be translated to X and Y coordinates if you have the location of the origin or simply by using for instance 0, 0 as origin. The Z is height and probably does not need any processing (unless it is the height from a certain pont of reference).

 

(image taken from: Bearing Distance To Line—Help | ArcGIS for Desktop )

In arcpy the PointGeometry—Help | ArcGIS for Desktop class has a method pointFromAngleAndDistance (angle, distance, {method}) which could be used to create the actual 3D geometry. If you are willing to share a small part of the data, I can show you how.