Yes the shot is reflectorless, more importantly perhaps is the method is resection / free station. The most important thing here is getting good geometry and redundancy. Consider all the positions (stations) that you are likely to setup your scanner, mark at point on the ground at each of those positions, and place targets such that you have at least one visible target inside each quadrant of a circle surrounding that position, ideally not too close to the position. Then, if needed, add extra positions such that each target is visible from at least three station positions. Then survey in all the targets with a total station from each station position, take two or more rounds of measurement, take the results into a dedicated adjustment package such as STAR*NET (or even better SCC ) and you're done. Height of instrument is also very important here so make sure to get it rightnyterydur wrote: ↑Wed Jun 29, 2022 10:11 pmI guess from a surveying standpoint however, that's considered a reflectorless shot. This means that we are not shooting a prisim on a rod like normal and the signal is not being reflected back to the receiver to be "corrected". You are only relying on what your eyeball sees as far as aligning the crosshairs of the TS to be as exact as possible on the checkerboard. I'm being told that reflectorless shots on a TS are not as accurate, but maybe that's because our TS (which we do own) is quite dated. Not sure if newer technology has improved this.
Possibly worth noting that a good control survey for scanning can involve the same amount or more site work than the scanning itself. As others have said, if this is a one off situation, getting in a good surveyor will likely produce a better result at a lower cost than attempting it yourself for the first time. That said, it is a worthwhile skill to learn and should be well within the ability of those with a good amount of scanning experience. If you do use a surveyor, tell them not to use regular retro targets as they don't play well with some scanners.