Turning a two-dimensional image sensor to an attitude sensor: Image matching for determining satellite attitudes

We demonstrate how to utilize a two-dimensional image sensor onboard a satellite for determining its attitude. The method is based on image matching between satellite images and Earth surfaces. To achieve this, image feature extraction and robust estimation techniques are employed. Experimental results showed that the accuracy of attitude determination is about 0.02° if the satellite position has been precisely determined. The contribution of this paper is not on technical novelty, as the method has already been described in [1], but on additional examples illustrating the utility of the method.