Detecting optical discrepancies in captured images
AssigneeSkydio, Inc.
InventorsRyan Kennedy, Peter Henry, Abraham Bachrach
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
Embodiments are described for detecting optical discrepancies associated with image capture analyzing pixels in multiple images corresponding to common points of reference in a physical environment. In an embodiment, photometric error values are averaged over time to compute the mean error at each pixel. Once the estimate of the mean error has a sufficient number of updates above a specified value, the estimate is thresholded to provide a mask of any optical discrepancies occurring in the stereo pair of images. Applications include detecting optical discrepancies in images captured for use by a visual navigation system in guiding an autonomous vehicle (e.g., an unmanned aerial vehicle).
Claims20
A method for autonomously navigating an aerial vehicle through a physical environment, the method comprising:
- obtaining a first image at a first position of the aerial vehicle and a second image at a second position of the aerial vehicle different than the first position;
- for a pixel of the first image, computing a photometric error with respect to candidate pixels of the second image along an epipolar correspondence between the first and second positions;
- detecting, based at least in part on the photometric error, an optical discrepancy associated with a contiguous region in a field of view of an image capture device of the aerial vehicle;
- and
- generating control commands configured to autonomously maneuver the aerial vehicle through the physical environment by excluding the region from a visual-navigation control computation used to generate the control commands such that the region is ignored when estimating motion and/or scene structure.
A vehicle comprising:
- an image capture device configured to capture images of a physical environment;
- a propulsion system configured to maneuver the vehicle through the physical environment;
- and
- a visual navigation system configured to:
- obtain a first image at a first position of the vehicle and a second image at a second position of the vehicle different than the first position;
- for a pixel of the first image, compute a photometric error with respect to candidate pixels of the second image along an epipolar correspondence between the first and second positions;
- detect, based at least in part on the photometric error, an optical discrepancy associated with a contiguous region in a field of view of an image capture device of the vehicle;
- and
- generate control commands configured to autonomously maneuver the vehicle through the physical environment by excluding the region from control computation used to generate the control commands such that the region is ignored when estimating motion and/or scene structure.
An apparatus comprising:
- one or more computer-readable media;
- and
- program instructions stored on the one or more computer-readable storage media that, when executed by one or more processors of a vehicle, direct the one or more processors to at least:
- obtain a first image at a first position of the vehicle and a second image at a second position of the vehicle that is different from the first position;
- compute, for a pixel of the first image, a photometric error with respect to candidate pixels of the second image along an epipolar correspondence between the first and second positions;
- detect, based at least in part on the photometric error, an optical discrepancy associated with a contiguous region in a field of view of an image capture device of the vehicle;
- and
- generate control commands configured to autonomously maneuver the vehicle through the physical environment by excluding the region from control computation used to generate the control commands such that the region is ignored when estimating the motion and/or scene structure.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.