An Application of Surface Reconstruction from Rotational Motion

For surface reconstruction using motion, objects are placed on a rotating disc in front of a single camera. For camera calibration the method by [Tsai 1986] was implemented, extended (calculation of distorted from undisturbed coordinates) and optimized (e.g. with respect to the number of calibration planes and points in each plane). It is described how the calibration results can be used for this special case of surface reconstruction of objects on a rotating disc. Motion vectors calculated from point correspondences are used as input for this calculation of 3-D point positions. In two theorems, new reconstruction formulas are given. Experimentally, accurate depth values could be obtained for sparse object surface points. It is suggested to combine these exact values with "surface drafts" calculated by approaches based on reflectance properties.