Survey Studio guide

Open the workspace and choose Import files, or Try synthetic mine for a generated test site. The synthetic mine is in local metres and is not a real place; a SYNTHETIC badge stays on screen while it is open.

Drag to orbit, right-drag or two fingers to pan, scroll or pinch to zoom. A click selects a point and shows its source index and coordinates in the status strip. Dragging never adds a point.

Coordinates are kept as 64-bit numbers exactly as read. The 3D view draws them relative to a local origin so large grid values do not lose precision on the graphics card.

A file without a declared reference is shown as reference unknown. You can declare it as a named local metre grid; Survey Studio does not yet apply map projections, datum shifts or geoid models, and it never guesses one.

Build terrain surface turns a point layer into a triangulated surface. Points that form a complete regular grid are joined cell by cell; other points use a Delaunay triangulation. Two points at the same position with different heights are refused instead of averaged.

Meshes that fold back over themselves (overhangs) are kept as general meshes. Volumes and sections need a single-valued terrain surface.

Volumes use dz = current minus reference. Fill is where the current surface is above the reference, cut is where it is below. The two surfaces and the boundary are overlaid triangle by triangle and each piece is integrated exactly, so there is no grid size to choose. A 1 m grid cross-check is offered for comparison and is labelled as an approximation.

The reference can be another surface, a flat level, or a best-fit plane through the boundary vertices. For level and plane references the result also shows how much the net volume changes if the base moves 5 cm up or down.

A deadband ignores small differences: zero band counts nothing where |dz| is within the threshold, threshold subtracted also removes the threshold from larger differences. Density is an assumption you enter; tonnage is never estimated from images.

Bench volumes split fill and cut by elevation band. Flitch thicknesses must add up to the bench height; a mismatch is an error, not a silent rescale. Storage at a level is the volume between a flat water surface and the ground, assuming the area is closed. Spill points are not detected.

A section is cut exactly along the line through the surface triangles. Vertical exaggeration changes the drawing only; the exported CSV is true scale. Where the line leaves the surface the profile shows a gap instead of joining across it.

Survey Studio does not claim an accuracy. Volumes are exact for the surfaces you give it, so they are only as good as those surfaces. Without independent checkpoints, reports state: "Absolute accuracy not independently assessed (no checkpoints)."

Compare with points reports surface height minus point height for each point that falls on the surface. It is vertical only, and points that were used to build or control a surface are not an independent check.

Projects autosave in this browser once they have a layer. Browser storage can be cleared, so export a .zsurvey backup for anything you need to keep. You can leave the original files out of the backup; the archive then lists what was omitted, and you can relink a file later. It is matched by its SHA-256 fingerprint, not its name.

If a project is open in two tabs, only the first one saves, so neither overwrites the other.

Every panel control is a standard button, field or list reachable with Tab. Each layer list has a table version, results are given as text alongside any colour, and cut and fill are named, not only coloured. The 3D view is pointer-operated; everything it shows is also available from the panels.