System and method of calibrating a directional light source relative to a camera's field of view
AssigneePosition Imaging, Inc.
InventorsDrew Anthony Schena, Guohua Min
Life of this patent
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Abstract
A system and method for calibrating location and orientation of a directional light source relative to a field of view of an optical device includes a directional light source that directs light to points on a virtual grid overlaying the field of view of the optical device. The optical device captures an image for each point on the virtual grid at which the directional light source directs light. A light dot is located in a plurality of captured images. The location and orientation of the directional light source are calibrated relative to the field of view of the optical device based on coordinates of each located light dot and on relative coordinates of the optical device.
Claims25
A method of calibrating a movable directional light source relative to an optical device, the method comprising the steps of:
- virtually projecting a virtual grid comprised of predefined points onto an area. having at least one object disposed therein at an unknown location;
- aiming the directional light source at each predefined point, in succession, of the virtual grid;
- capturing by the optical device, for each predefined point of the virtual grid at which the light source is aimed, a first image of the area while the directional light source is active and a second image of the area while the directional light source is turned off;
- comparing, for each predefined point of the virtual grid at which the directional light source is aimed, the first and second images captured for that predefined point;
- searching for a light dot in the first image captured at each predefined point based on the comparison of the first and second images captured for that predefined point;
- and
- calibrating a location and orientation of the directional light source relative to the optical device based on angle data of the directional light source associated with each image in which the light dot is found, so that the directional light source can be aimed at a new target within a field of view of the optical device in a single movement while the directional light source is turned off.
A system comprising:
- a movable directional light source aimed, in succession, at each predefined point of a virtual grid that is projected onto an area having therein at least one object disposed at an unknown location;
- an optical device having a field of view that covers at least a portion of the area, the optical device being configured to capture, for each predefined point of the virtual grid at which the light source is aimed, a first image of the area within the field of view of the optical device while the light source is active and a second image of the area within the field of view of the optical device while the light source is turned off;
- and
- a processing unit in communication with the directional light source and the optical device, the processing unit being configured to compare the first and second images captured by the optical device for each predefined point of the virtual grid at which the light source was aimed and to search for a light dot in the first image captured for each predefined point based on the comparison of the first and second images captured for that predefined point, the processing unit being further configured to calibrate a location and orientation of the directional light source relative, the optical device based on angle data of the directional light source associated with each image in which the processing unit finds the light dot so that the directional light source can be aimed at a new target within the field of view of the optical device in a single movement while the directional light source is turned off.
A method for calibrating location and orientation of a directional light source relative to a field of view of an optical device, the method comprising:
- directing light from the directional light source to a plurality of points on a virtual grid configured to overlay the field of view of the optical device;
- capturing, by the optical device, for each point of the plurality of points on the virtual grid to which the directional light source directs the light, an image;
- locating a light dot in a plurality of captured images;
- calibrating the location and orientation of the directional light source relative to the field of view of the optical device based on coordinates of each located light dot and on relative coordinates of the optical device.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.