Generating a merged, fused three-dimensional point cloud based on captured images of a scene

Abstract

Presenting a merged, fused three-dimensional point cloud includes acquiring multiple sets of images of a scene from different vantage points, each set of images including respective stereo matched images and a color image. For each respective set of images, a disparity map based on the plurality of stereo images is obtained, data from the color image is fused onto the disparity map so as to generate a fused disparity map, and a three-dimensional fused point cloud is created from the fused disparity map. The respective three-dimensional fused point clouds is merged together so as to obtain a merged, fused three-dimensional point cloud. The techniques can be advantageous even under the constraints of sparseness and low-depth resolution, and are suitable, in some cases, for real-time or near real-time applications in which computing time needs to be reduced.