1

I am looking for a way to compress files other than LASZip that may make the files a bit more smaller, is there an efficient way to do this?

Would zipping up a LAZ file further compress the file? Or is it unnecessarily redundant.

I am working with a large amount of data that I have zipped into LAZ format, but was wondering if there were further steps I could take to reduce the size even more.

Improve this question

2 Answers 2

Reset to default
1

To answer your first question: No. The tools and supporting documentation over at LASzip.org covers the details. A lossless compression is absolutely critical with LAS data and this group has ASPRS official support afaik.

To answer your second question: No. Though you really ought to have tried that yourself. Also, 7zip is no improvement over WinZip, etc.

Improve this answer
1

There are things you can do to the files before you compress them to make the LAZ compression more efficient. Sort them based on GPSTime if you have that attribute. Sort them along a space-filling curve if you don’t.

Zero out attributes you don’t need. If you have color information in raster data elsewhere, it will be much more efficient to compress them separately than to store per-point color information in LAZ.

Improve this answer
2
  • Is there a way to remove any unnecessary info from the LAS files that may be taking up a lot of space? I work primarily with 1m resolution LiDAR data and I've noticed that there are often huge differences in size of 1km square tiles. One tile may be close to a gb of data whereas another tile of similar size and resolution might be just a few mb and I wonder what is the main cause of this, point density?
    – Scott4993
    Commented Jul 26, 2019 at 12:06
  • It should be noted that in sorting you may be destroying relationships between the data points that las does not guarantee but are often given as a natural ordering off a lidar head, e.g. what second and later return belong to what first return.
    – Paul Childs
    Commented Aug 4, 2023 at 2:26

Your Answer

By clicking “Post Your Answer”, you agree to our terms of service and acknowledge you have read our privacy policy.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged or ask your own question.