Aimer localization and triangulation in multi-sensor scanner

An apparatus of an optical scanner for scanning a subject, the apparatus comprising:

• interface circuitry including an input to receive a plurality of images from a plurality of image-capture devices;
• and
• controller circuitry coupled to the interface circuitry and the input, the controller circuitry operative to perform a ranging determination, the ranging determination including a localization phase and a triangulation phase, wherein:
• each image of the plurality of images from each of the plurality of image-capture devices has a device-specific positional offset of the captured aimer spot that varies based on a distance between a respective image-capture device and the surface of the subject, and further based on a relative position of that respective image-capture device and a projector of the aimer spot;
• the localization phase identifies a probable location of the aimer spot within the captured image frames;
• and
• in the triangulation phase the probable location of the aimer spot is processed to assess whether that probable location of the aimer spot is within a plausible location based on different device-specific positional offsets in image frames captured by different ones of the plurality of image-capture devices;
• wherein the ranging determination represents a distance between the optical scanner and the surface of the subject.

A method for operating an optical scanner for scanning a subject, the method comprising:

• autonomously receiving a plurality of images from a at least one image-capture device;
• and
• autonomously performing a ranging determination, the ranging determination including a localization phase and a triangulation phase, wherein:
• in the localization phase, a series of image frames is received, the series of image frames collectively containing an aimer spot captured as a reflection off of a surface of the subject, the captured aimer spot being temporally modulated according to a modulation pattern, and the series of image frames is processed to discriminate the aimer spot based on the modulation pattern to determine a probable location of the aimer spot within at least one of the image frames of the series;
• and
• in the triangulation phase, the probable location of the aimer spot is processed to produce the ranging determination, wherein the ranging determination represents a distance between the at least one image-capture device and the surface of the subject.