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You can now bring ground-based surveys from GPS rovers and total stations into Propeller. 🗺️📍

Drones have revolutionized the industry, but they’re not the right tool for every job.

Many of you have told us that managing survey data across multiple software platforms is a major pain point.

With drone surveys in Propeller and ground-based surveys stored elsewhere, creating a unified source of truth can feel out of reach.

That’s now changed.

You can now upload surveys from GPS rovers or total stations as TIN surfaces directly into Propeller. 

 

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The result? Your Propeller map becomes a powerful single source of truth—even without drone data—unlocking deeper insights and maximizing the platform’s value across your projects.

To support this new functionality, we’re updating several core workflows and introducing some new ones, including improvements to the data upload process. Here’s what’s changed and when.

 

🔎 Important things to know 

  • To ensure a smooth transition and minimize disruptions, users received the following updates in phases.
  • The way you upload designs and media has changed. We’ve introducing a new Upload button, making it easier to upload surveys, designs, and media
  • The Merge datasets feature has been updated to Create composite, providing enhanced composite capabilities
  • You’re now able to upload and manage GPS rover and total station surveys in the platform as a TIN surface (DXF, TTM, XML)
  • All your survey data (no matter the data capture method) now integrates seamlessly into Propeller.

 

New | Available now 🟢

TIN surfaces 

Upload TIN surfaces (DXF, TTM, XML) from any ground-based survey equipment, including GPS rovers and Total Stations. 

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What’s new? 

We’ve invited ground-based surveys from GPS rovers and total stations into the Propellerverse. 

You’re now able to use the same trusted analytics tools on your ground-based surveys, alongside your drone surveys, creating a unified source of truth.

New connectivity means new insights—and fewer headaches. Finally say goodbye to those mad-scientist workarounds.

 

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Here’s how you might use ground-based surveys in Propeller:

  • Patch drone surveys: Use GPS rovers to capture surfaces that drones can’t reach, like ground obscured by trees, grass, or water after rain. By combining drone and ground-based surveys, you'll get the most accurate surface possible.
  • Inter-flight progress updates: Sometimes, flying the drone isn’t practical—whether due to staffing, site availability, or small capture areas. With TIN surfaces, the rover can fill in as needed, potentially even daily.
  • Progressive surveys over time: For ongoing work like stripping, trenching, or road layering, GPS rovers and total stations let you capture each stage as it happens. A GPS rover picks up these evolving surfaces before you dump a load of material on top.
  • As-built accuracy with a total station: When precision matters, like building pads or curbs, total stations capture TIN surfaces at millimeter-level accuracy, exceeding that of drones or GPS rovers.

Recommended resources: 

 

New | Available now 🟢

New Upload button

Upload surveys, designs, and media using a single button. 

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What’s new? 

We’ve introduced a yellow UPLOAD button in the top-right corner of the platform. 

Unassuming, but powerful. Why? It’s a universal upload button that reduces the number of clicks you need to bring surveys, designs, and media into Propeller.   

The new UPLOAD button is your all-in-one hub for uploading surveys, designs, and media.

 

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What changed? 

  1. We’ve retired the current UPLOAD MEDIA and UPLOAD DESIGN buttons. In the past, you navigated through the MEDIA tab to upload media and the DESIGNS tab to bring in new designs. These upload buttons have been removed and replaced by the new universal UPLOAD button described above. 

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  1. You now have an easier way to upload drone data for processing.
    No need to panic — DATA PROCESSING is staying put (for now), but the new UPLOAD button now provides a faster, alternative path to uploading new surveys for processing.

Recommended resources: 

 

New | Available now 🟢

Composite Builder

An improved way to merge multiple surveys into a measurable map.

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What changed? 

In the past, you merged surveys like this:

  • Clicked the SURVEY drop-down in the top menu.
  • Selected Merge datasets and choose the surveys to combine.

Easy, but limiting. What if you want to merge an orthophoto from one survey and a point cloud from another?

This process will soon evolve. Head to the same place, but instead of Merging datasets, click Create Composite. This will create a new composite, in which the map becomes your blank canvas. 

The new functionality is designed to give you more layer flexibility when building or viewing your composite. Mix and match terrain and orthophoto, control stacking order, and toggle on Point Cloud or Vertical Face Imagery (VFI).

Recommended resources: 

 

New | Available now 🟢

Survey Explorer 

Visualize any survey data together on the map to plan, review, and tell a story.

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What’s new? 

You already have access to this one.  It was the first step in our mission to unify all your survey data. Find it at the bottom of the SURVEY tab. Just open, select the data you want to view, and visualize everything in a single, connected view.

Recommended resources: 

 

And that’s it for now, folks. Questions or feedback? Give us a shout. 👋

 

I still can't do it!

We wrote these articles to equip you with everything you need to get the job done on your own, but we understand that sometimes this isn't sufficient.

If you're stuck, you can connect with our support team by clicking the support button on the top right corner of your user portal.

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