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- 3D IMAGING FOR RAPID RESPONSE ON REMOTE SITES
- J-A Beraldin, F. Blais, L. Cournoyer, M. Rioux, S.H. El-Hakim
- ViT Lab, National Research Council Canada,
- Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, K1A 0R6
- angelo.beraldin@iit.nrc.ca
-
- ABSTRACT
- A compact 3D laser imaging system is presented for heritage recording
- applications that require rapid response on remote sites affected by natural
- disasters. Though portability is important, accuracy is preserved in order to
- obtain high-quality realistic 3D reconstruction. A summary of experimental
- results acquired in 1997 and 1998 in Italy is presented in this paper.
-
- 1. INTRODUCTION
- Non-contact measurement techniques like those based on structured light have
- found wide spread use in industrial metrology and reverse engineering. Laser-
- based technologies attempt to structure the environment, through artificial
- light projection means. The results are dense range maps extracted from visible
- surfaces that are rather featureless to the naked eye. In the field of heritage
- recording, on-site and complete 3D documentation is necessary in situations
- where objects and/or environments can't be moved or their access is restricted
- because of natural causes e.g. earthquake or tourism-related degradation. 3D
- acquisitions will have to be performed in a relatively short time frame from
- several hours to maybe a day, hence, rapid response. In addition, many
- applications do not allow any alterations to the object and surroundings to suit
- the vision system, e.g., by placing markings or changing the reflectivity of the
- surface with powder or by abrasion. We have put together a self-contained 3D
- imaging system capable of satisfying many demanding on site 3D documentation
- tasks. Special attention is placed on accuracy, as it is critical for obtaining
- high-quality reconstruction of 3D models from range imagery.
-
- 2. COMPACT 3D RANGE CAMERA
- The range camera, Biris, (Figure 1) was developed to work in difficult
- environments where reliability, robustness, and ease of maintenance are as
- important as accuracy [see URLs]. The main components of Biris are a solid-state
- laser diode, a CCD or CMOS camera, a camera lens, and a mask with two small
- apertures. This mask replaces the iris of the camera lens (Bi-iris). This
- imaging technique when combined with advanced signal processing algorithms
- allows Biris to become very tolerant to ambient light illumination, e.g. sun
- light. The Biris camera is mounted on a pan unit and tripod, and, is connected
- to a PCI card installed in a portable PC. The reconstruction of a 3-D object is
- achieved by acquiring a sufficient number of range images that cover the surface
- of that object. The views must have enough overlap between them to find their
- relative spatial position and orientation.
-
- 3. RESULTS FROM REMOTE SITES IN ITALY 1997-98
- Figure 1 and 2 show a number of 3D models acquired in Italy over a 2-year
- period. The models include a marble sculpture of the Madonna col Bambino by G.
- Pisano, a bronze bas-relief from Donatello and some architectural elements from
- the old Abbey of Pomposa. All the range images for these projects were acquired
- in three separate one-day sessions. The generation of the models is done using
- the software Polyworks on a PC. A number of sites have been documented using
- either Biris or NRC's other 3D technologies. The sites are in Israel, Florence,
- NASA, Boston and Canada. They are described at the following URL's.
-
- 4. FURTHER INFORMATION - URL
- http://www.vit.iit.nrc.ca/blais/bi_home.html
- http://www.vit.iit.nrc.ca/beraldin/Web_italia/Biris_in_ITALY.html
- http://www.vit.iit.nrc.ca/Pages_Html/English/Research.html
- http://www.vit.iit.nrc.ca/Pages_Html/English/Applications.html
- http://www.innovmetric.com/
-
- Figure 1 Top and center: portable 3D imaging system includes a Biris camera
- (standoff 30 cm, range 200 cm, data rate 15 360 3D samples per sec, weight 900
- gr.), a pan unit and a tripod, Bottom: outdoor application at the Abbey of
- Pomposa (circa 850 ce) in Italy 1998.
-
- Figure 2 Top and center: Madonna col Bambino, G. Pisano (circa 1305 ce) showing
- the 7 distinct color-coded images used for the face, model of the top portion
- using 62 views for a total of 1,340,000 polygons, Bottom: bronze bas-relief of
- Donatello (circa 1446-1450), model with about 580 000 polygons, Italy 1997.
-