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Abstract

Estimating motions of a multi-camera system which may not have overlapping fields of view is generally complex and computationally expensive because of the non-zero offset between each camera’s center. It is conceivable that if we can assume that multiple cameras share a single optical center, and thus can be modeled as a spherical imaging system, motion estimation and calibration of this system would become simpler and more efficient. In this paper, we analytically and empirically derive the conditions under which a multi-camera system can be modeled as a single spherical camera. Various analyses and experiments using simulated and real images show that spherical approximation is applicable to a surprisingly larger extent than currently expected. Moreover, we show that, when applicable, this approximation even results in improvements in accuracy and stability of estimated motion over the exact algorithm.

Keywords

Camera Motion Estimation, Multiple Cameras, Spherical Approximation, Camera Calibration, Structure from Motion

Notes

Number of pages: 16

Text Reference

Junsik Kim, Myung Hwangbo, and Takeo Kanade, "Spherical Approximation for Multiple Cameras in Motion Estimation: its Applicability and Advantages," Computer Vision and Image Understanding, Vol. 114, No. 10, October, 2010, pp. 1068-1083.

BibTeX Reference

@article{Kim_2010_6719,
   author = "Junsik Kim and Myung Hwangbo and Takeo Kanade",
   title = "Spherical Approximation for Multiple Cameras in Motion Estimation: its Applicability and Advantages",
   journal = "Computer Vision and Image Understanding",
   pages = "1068-1083",
   publisher = "Elsevier",
   month = "October",
   year = "2010",
   volume = "114",
   number = "10",
}

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