Shoreline Mapping using an Omni-directional Camera for Autonomous Surface Vehicle Applications

Autonomous surface vehicles (ASVs) have the potential to operate for extended periods of time in coastal, estuarine, and riverine environments for a variety of scientific, environmental, and military applications. However, these environments are often highly dynamic and unstructured, and present new challenges for autonomous operations. Toward the goal of achieving truly autonomous long-term operations in highly unstructured maritime environments, we present a new approach to create a shoreline map with an ASV in real-time by combining the analysis of images from a single omni-directional camera and knowledge of the vehicle's location and motion information