Improving Depth Image Acquisition Using Polarized Light

  • Authors:
  • A. M. Wallace;B. Liang;E. Trucco;J. Clark

  • Affiliations:
  • Department of Computing and Electrical Engineering, Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh EH14 4AS, Scotland. andy@cee.hw.ac.uk;Department of Computing and Electrical Engineering, Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh EH14 4AS, Scotland. bojian@cee.hw.ac.uk;Department of Computing and Electrical Engineering, Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh EH14 4AS, Scotland. mtc@cee.hw.ac.uk;Department of Computing and Electrical Engineering, Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh EH14 4AS, Scotland. jclark@cee.hw.ac.uk

  • Venue:
  • International Journal of Computer Vision
  • Year:
  • 1999

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Abstract

Control of the source and analysis of the polarization propertiesof the reflected light in a laser rangefinder based on triangulationoffer a potential solution to the problem of distinguishing the primarylaser stripe from unwanted inter-reflections caused by holes and concavities on metal surfaces. In this paper, the established polarization theory of firstand subsequent inter-reflections from metallic surfaces is reviewed. This provides a point of comparison for ellipsometricmeasurements which verify the particular applicability of the microfacet surface model in our context.We demonstrate how a conventional laser rangefinder can be modified to discriminate between primary and secondary reflections.However, our experiments on third and subsequent reflectionsshow that more complex models are required to providecomplete resolution of the problem.Furthermore, error analysis demonstrates the requirement for very precisecontrol of the source and receiving optoelectronics. We conclude by demonstrating the acquisition ofa depth image with and without polarization optics and discuss thesignificance of our results for laser depth measurement.