Scan-based registration of range measurements

This paper introduces an automatic approach for registration estimation between successive viewpoints of a laser range camera that takes advantage of the raw measurements and does not require any external device for pose estimation nor complex feature extraction or triangulation. Assuming only object rigidity and some overlap between the scan areas, the approach allows to estimate the six rotation and translation parameters that link 3-D scans gathered from different viewpoints. A compact modified Gaussian sphere representation is used to encode a simple planar patch approximation of the objects surface and to validate mapping between the measurements as the appropriate rotation and translation parameters are computed. This solution results in an important reduction of the computational workload and a sufficient accuracy for most robot navigation applications. The proposed approach is demonstrated in an experimental context using real range measurements collected from a series of viewpoints.