A study-based ranking of LiDAR data visualization schemes aided by georectified aerial images

Light Detection and Ranging (LiDAR) collects dense 3D topographic information in the form of points. LiDAR data can be displayed either through direct rendering of the point cloud or by generalizing features extracted through classification or segmentation. We are working in the domain of visualizing LiDAR data sets and have developed certain pipelines for visualization. These pipelines have been presented elsewhere. We present a technique for the evaluation of visualization schemes for LiDAR data, by conducting a visualization experience survey for 13 pre-processing and visualization schemes where 60 participants rated these schemes on a 10 point scale on a questionnaire. The paper establishes a ranking for the different visualization schemes described herein. Finally, this paper establishes that our heuristic-based algorithm (presented elsewhere) performs almost equal to a classification-based visualization pipeline made using professional software. We believe that the presented technique can be used to assess other geospatial visualization schemes.