Navigating, Recognizing and Describing Urban Spaces With Vision and Lasers

  • Authors:

  • Paul Newman;Gabe Sibley;Mike Smith;Mark Cummins;Alastair Harrison;Chris Mei;Ingmar Posner;Robbie Shade;Derik Schroeter;Liz Murphy;Winston Churchill;Dave Cole;Ian Reid

  • Affiliations:

  • Oxford Mobile Robotics Group, Department of EngineeringScience, University of Oxford, Parks Road, Oxford, UK;Oxford Mobile Robotics Group, Department of EngineeringScience, University of Oxford, Parks Road, Oxford, UK;Oxford Mobile Robotics Group, Department of EngineeringScience, University of Oxford, Parks Road, Oxford, UK;Oxford Mobile Robotics Group, Department of EngineeringScience, University of Oxford, Parks Road, Oxford, UK;Oxford Mobile Robotics Group, Department of EngineeringScience, University of Oxford, Parks Road, Oxford, UK;Active Vision Lab, Department of Engineering Science,University of Oxford, Parks Road, Oxford, UK;Oxford Mobile Robotics Group, Department of EngineeringScience, University of Oxford, Parks Road, Oxford, UK;Oxford Mobile Robotics Group, Department of EngineeringScience, University of Oxford, Parks Road, Oxford, UK;Oxford Mobile Robotics Group, Department of EngineeringScience, University of Oxford, Parks Road, Oxford, UK;Oxford Mobile Robotics Group, Department of EngineeringScience, University of Oxford, Parks Road, Oxford, UK;Oxford Mobile Robotics Group, Department of EngineeringScience, University of Oxford, Parks Road, Oxford, UK;Oxford Mobile Robotics Group, Department of EngineeringScience, University of Oxford, Parks Road, Oxford, UK;Active Vision Lab, Department of Engineering Science,University of Oxford, Parks Road, Oxford, UK

  • Venue:
  • International Journal of Robotics Research
  • Year:
  • 2009

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Abstract

In this paper we describe a body of work aimed at extending the reach of mobile navigation and mapping. We describe how running topological and metric mapping and pose estimation processes concurrently, using vision and laser ranging, has produced a full six-degree-of-freedom outdoor navigation system. It is capable of producing intricate three-dimensional maps over many kilometers and in real time. We consider issues concerning the intrinsic quality of the built maps and describe our progress towards adding semantic labels to maps via scene de-construction and labeling. We show how our choices of representation, inference methods and use of both topological and metric techniques naturally allow us to fuse maps built from multiple sessions with no need for manual frame alignment or data association.