Densifying and colorizing point cloud representation of physical surface using image data

A computer program product comprising a non-transitory computer usable medium embodying computer usable program code for densifying and colorizing a point cloud representation of a physical surface, the computer program product comprising:

• computer usable program code for receiving a set of measured surface points representing a surface sampling of a three-dimensional physical surface, each measured surface point having a position in a three-dimensional coordinate reference frame;
• computer usable program code for receiving at least one image acquired by an image acquisition unit and representing an image sampling of the physical surface,
• wherein:
• the image sampling of the physical surface in the at least one image at least partially overlaps the surface sampling of the physical surface;
• the image sampling of the physical surface in the at least one image is denser than the surface sampling of the physical surface;
• and
• each image is a digital image comprising a plurality of pixels each having a color and an image position in the image;
• computer usable program code for receiving image metadata associated with each image, the image metadata including an estimate of position and orientation of the image acquisition unit in the coordinate reference frame at the time the image acquisition unit acquired the image to which the image metadata corresponds, the image metadata further including calibration parameters for the image acquisition unit;
• and
• computer usable program code for, for each image:
• isolating from the set of measured surface points a subset of measured surface points comprising those measured surface points that are within a field of view of that image;
• and
• using the image positions of the pixels in that image, the subset of measured surface points and the image metadata associated with that image to calculate colorized implied surface points;
• wherein:
• each colorized implied surface point has a position in the coordinate reference frame;
• each colorized implied surface point is associated with a corresponding pixel;
• and
• each colorized implied surface point has the color of its corresponding pixel.

A computer system for densifying and colorizing a point cloud representation of a physical surface, comprising:

• a memory for storing instructions;
• a processing unit coupled to the memory for executing the instructions stored in the memory, wherein the instructions, when executed by the processing unit, cause the computing device to:
• receive a set of measured surface points representing a surface sampling of a three-dimensional physical surface, each measured surface point having a position in a three-dimensional coordinate reference frame;
• receive at least one image acquired by an image acquisition unit and representing an image sampling of the physical surface;
• wherein:
• the image sampling of the physical surface in the at least one image at least partially overlaps the surface sampling of the physical surface;
• the image sampling of the physical surface in the at least one image is denser than the surface sampling of the physical surface;
• and
• each image is a digital image comprising a plurality of pixels each having a color and an image position in the image;
• receive image metadata associated with each image, the image metadata including an estimate of position and orientation of the image acquisition unit in the coordinate reference frame at the time the image acquisition unit acquired the image to which the image metadata corresponds, the image metadata further including calibration parameters for the image acquisition unit;
• and
• for each image:
• isolate from the set of measured surface points a subset of measured surface points comprising those measured surface points that are within a field of view of that image;
• use the image positions of the pixels in that image, the subset of measured surface points and the image metadata associated with that image to calculate colorized implied surface points;
• wherein:
• each colorized implied surface point has a position in the coordinate reference frame;
• each colorized implied surface point is associated with a corresponding pixel;
• and
• each colorized implied surface point has the color of its corresponding pixel.