Field boundaries & obstacles

A field boundary is the polygon that delineates the area to be treated or surveyed. DroneField uses boundaries to generate application maps, DJI Agras and ISOXML exports, and to compute area statistics for the report.

Boundary types

DroneField recognises four polygon types:

Type	Meaning
Field boundary	The target area (outer contour)
Obstacle	Tree, pole, wire — the drone steers around it
No-spray zone	Riverbank, neighbouring plot — no spraying allowed
Measurement	Length / area measurement only; no effect on exports

You can have multiple of each type per project. Obstacles and no-spray zones are interpreted inside the field boundary, and each type is drawn with its own distinctive map pattern, so they are easy to tell apart at a glance.

Circular zones are edited live: an obstacle or no-spray zone drawn as a circle can be moved by dragging its centre and resized by dragging its edge — the change is applied immediately.

Boundary toolbar

When you click the Field boundaries layer in the left sidebar, a Boundary toolbar appears at the top of the map — a floating 2-row window with these buttons:

Top row (creation):

• Add — start a new polygon or circle, or let the AI draw the boundary for you with AI Boundary — click the field on the orthomosaic and refine with + / − points
• Import — KML, SHP, or from a previous project

Bottom row (editing — only visible while drawing):

• Undo — undo last vertex (⌘Z also works)
• Save — save the drawn polygon
• Cancel — abandon drawing

Drawing a new polygon

1. Click Add. A type picker appears: Field boundary, Obstacle, No-spray zone, Measurement.
2. Pick the type — e.g. Field boundary.
3. Click on the map to place vertices along the boundary. Each click is a new vertex.
4. When done, press Return or click Close polygon on the toolbar. The last point automatically connects to the first.
5. A small dialog asks for a name — e.g. “Field 856”.
6. Click Done & save.

The polygon appears on the map and in the layer list.

Removing a point while drawing

If you placed a vertex in the wrong spot:

• ⌘Z or the toolbar Undo button
• Right-click on the vertex → Delete point
• Cancel the whole drawing with Cancel

Circles

For Obstacle and No-spray zone types, a Circle icon also appears — click a centre point and drag to set radius. Ideal for safety zones around trees or poles.

Editing an existing polygon

You can move vertices of an existing polygon later:

1. Click the boundary in the left layer list (selects it).
2. Vertex handles appear on the map.
3. Drag to move them.
4. Insert new vertices by clicking the empty handles in the middle of each edge.
5. Delete a vertex with right-click → Delete vertex.
6. Changes save immediately — no separate “save” step.

The toolbar’s Cancel button reverts the whole edit to the original polygon.

Import — KML, SHP, from a previous project

The toolbar’s Import button opens a sub-menu:

From KML

Google Earth and many GIS programs use KML. Pick the .kml file and every polygon inside is imported.

DroneField:

• Groups polygons by <Placemark> elements
• Uses the KML names as boundary names
• Picks up multiple types (polygon, line, point) — polygons become field boundaries; lines become Measurement type
• Works in WGS84 coordinates (as the KML standard requires)

From a previous project

If the same field was surveyed before in another project, you can reuse the boundary:

1. A dialog lists every previous project and its boundaries (by partner / project / boundary / obstacle count).
2. Search in the top field (partner, project, or boundary name).
3. Pick the right one and click Import.
4. The boundary and its obstacles come into the current project together.

This is the fastest way to revisit a field across seasons.

ESRI Shapefile (SHP) — from any projection

SHP is the most common professional GIS format. DroneField’s built-in PROJ library converts any coordinate reference system (CRS) to WGS84:

• HD72 / EOV (EPSG:23700) — the Hungarian national projection
• WGS84 (EPSG:4326) — global GPS projection
• UTM zones (EPSG:326xx)
• Web Mercator (EPSG:3857)
• And everything else in the PROJ EPSG database (~14 000 projections)

The CRS is detected automatically from the .prj file. If the SHP has no .prj, pick it manually from the list.

Imported boundaries come in with obstacles, when present in the source.

See SHP boundary import from elsewhere for the detailed guide.

Export

The toolbar’s Export button opens a wider menu:

DJI Agras

DJI Agras drones (T20, T30, T40, …) use a proprietary KML format. DroneField exports in two ways:

• Export (to project) — a .kml in the project’s Export/ folder
• Export (to USB stick) — directly onto the plugged-in USB stick, in the Agras-compatible folder layout

ISOXML V3 and V4

ISOXML (ISO 11783-10) is the industrial standard for agricultural machinery (John Deere, Case, Claas, Fendt, etc.). DroneField supports two versions:

• ISOXML V3 — for older terminals
• ISOXML V4 — for modern terminals

Both exportable as:

• To project — into Export/
• To USB stick — in the TASKDATA/ layout expected by tractor terminals

XAG drones

XAG Chinese agricultural drones (P40, P100, V40) use KML with a different structure. DroneField supports it directly.

When you save an XAG route and the project has no field boundary yet, DroneField generates one automatically with AI Boundary — the XAG cloud (nf.xa.com) requires a boundary for every route.

Video: planning a custom XAG route step by step:

ESRI Shapefile

The Shapefile export writes the multi-file bundle (.shp, .shx, .dbf, .prj) — in WGS84. Loads directly into QGIS and other GIS tools.

USB stick export — what to know

For USB exports DroneField auto-detects the connected stick:

• One stick — it’s picked automatically.
• Multiple sticks — a dialog asks you to choose.
• No stick — error: “No USB drive found! Plug a USB drive in.”

Never unplug the stick during the export — wait for the green checkmark.

The Exports/ folder layout

DroneField writes every exported file into the project’s Exports/ folder in a ready-made sub-structure — exactly the layout DJI Agras, XAG and tractor terminals expect. Copy the full Exports/DJI/ folder to the USB stick root — do not rename or restructure the sub-folders; the controllers look for these by fixed name.

Folder	Contents
Exports/DJI/KML/	Field boundary polygons (KML) — for the DJI Agras KML import
Exports/DJI/ShapeFile/	Field boundary as ESRI Shapefile (.shp/.shx/.dbf/.prj/.cpg) — companion to the VRA rate map
Exports/DJI/Rx/	Variable-rate prescription map as Float32 GeoTIFF (L/ha or kg/ha) + .tfw world file

After a full DJI VRA workflow Exports/ looks like this:

Exports/
└── DJI/
    ├── KML/
    │   └── Field856.kml
    ├── ShapeFile/
    │   ├── Field856_Boundary.shp
    │   ├── Field856_Boundary.shx
    │   ├── Field856_Boundary.dbf
    │   ├── Field856_Boundary.prj
    │   └── Field856_Boundary.cpg
    └── Rx/
        ├── Field856_Rx.tif
        └── Field856_Rx.tfw

Copy the entire Exports/DJI/ folder to the USB root — the final layout on the stick should be <USB>/DJI/KML/..., <USB>/DJI/ShapeFile/..., <USB>/DJI/Rx/....

⚠ If you export both the field boundary KML and a VRA prescription map for the same field, the DJI controller will list the field twice — once from the standalone KML and once from the Rx map (whose companion Shapefile already contains the boundary). For a VRA workflow the standalone KML export is redundant — copying just Rx/ + ShapeFile/ is enough.

Troubleshooting — controller doesn’t see the file

1. File name — max 12 characters, ASCII only (a-z A-Z 0-9 _ -). Accented letters (á é í ó ñ ü, etc.) and special characters (spaces, / \ : * ? " < > |) are not allowed. Examples:
   • ✅ Field856.kml
   • ❌ Field 856.kml
2. Path — the USB root must contain a DJI/KML/ folder (uppercase), not dji/kml/. Don’t rename the folder structure.
3. USB format — FAT32 or exFAT. NTFS and APFS are not seen by the Agras app.
4. Cache — eject and re-insert the stick; in the Agras / Pilot 2 app pull the file list down to refresh, or restart the app.

Often there’s no error message — just an “empty list”. That’s also a sign of an unsupported file name or renamed folder.

Length and area measurement

Measurement lines are for one-off use only — they are not exported and don’t affect the application map.

You draw a line, and the length is shown automatically (metres). A closed measurement polygon also displays the area (hectares).

Turn measurements on/off with the toolbar’s Toggle measurements button.

DroneField

🗺️ Field boundaries are the foundation of multispectral drone mapping. Learn more: Multispectral drone mapping with DroneField →

✈️ See how monitoring pilots prepare boundaries and obstacle maps for spray drone operators: Spray drone survey workflow →