Effect of target color and scanning geometry on terrestrial LiDAR point-cloud noise and plane fitting

2018 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 109-127 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dimitrios Bolkas ◽  
Aaron Martinez
Keyword(s):  
Point Cloud ◽  
Incidence Angle ◽  
Point Clouds ◽  
Parametric Modeling ◽  
Target Color ◽  
Terrestrial Lidar ◽  
Cloud Data ◽  
Plane Fitting ◽  
Scanning Geometry

AbstractPoint-cloud coordinate information derived from terrestrial Light Detection And Ranging (LiDAR) is important for several applications in surveying and civil engineering. Plane fitting and segmentation of target-surfaces is an important step in several applications such as in the monitoring of structures. Reliable parametric modeling and segmentation relies on the underlying quality of the point-cloud. Therefore, understanding how point-cloud errors affect fitting of planes and segmentation is important. Point-cloud intensity, which accompanies the point-cloud data, often goes hand-in-hand with point-cloud noise. This study uses industrial particle boards painted with eight different colors (black, white, grey, red, green, blue, brown, and yellow) and two different sheens (flat and semi-gloss) to explore how noise and plane residuals vary with scanning geometry (i.e., distance and incidence angle) and target-color. Results show that darker colors, such as black and brown, can produce point clouds that are several times noisier than bright targets, such as white. In addition, semi-gloss targets manage to reduce noise in dark targets by about 2–3 times. The study of plane residuals with scanning geometry reveals that, in many of the cases tested, residuals decrease with increasing incidence angles, which can assist in understanding the distribution of plane residuals in a dataset. Finally, a scheme is developed to derive survey guidelines based on the data collected in this experiment. Three examples demonstrate that users should consider instrument specification, required precision of plane residuals, required point-spacing, target-color, and target-sheen, when selecting scanning locations. Outcomes of this study can aid users to select appropriate instrumentation and improve planning of terrestrial LiDAR data-acquisition.

scholarly journals An Algorithm for Fitting Sphere Target of Terrestrial LiDAR

Sensors ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 21 (22) ◽  
pp. 7546
Author(s):  
Yintao Shi ◽  
Gang Zhao ◽  
Maomei Wang ◽  
Yi Xu ◽  
Dadong Zhu
Keyword(s):  
Point Cloud ◽  
Search Algorithm ◽  
Random Search ◽  
Point Clouds ◽  
Vital Role ◽  
Coverage Rate ◽  
Terrestrial Lidar ◽  
Cloud Data ◽  
Probability And Statistics ◽  
Fitting Accuracy

The sphere target played a vital role in terrestrial LiDAR applications, and solving its geometrical center based on point cloud was a widely concerned problem. In this study, we proposed a newly finite random search algorithm for sphere target fitting. Based on the point cloud data and the geometric characteristics of the sphere target, the algorithm realized the target sphere fitting from the perspective of probability and statistics with the help of parameter estimation. Firstly, an initial constraint space was constructed, and the initial center and radius were determined by finite random search. Then, the optimal spherical center and radius were determined gradually through continuous iterative optimization. We tested the algorithm with the simulated and realistic point cloud. Experimental results showed that the proposed algorithm could be effectively applied to all kinds of point cloud fitting. When the coverage rate was bigger than 30%, the fitting accuracy could reach within 0.01 mm for all kinds of point clouds. When the coverage rate was less than 20%, the fitting accuracy can reach ±1 mm, although it was reduced to a certain extent.

scholarly journals A COMPARATIVE STUDY OF POINT CLOUDS SEMANTIC SEGMENTATION USING THREE DIFFERENT NEURAL NETWORKS ON THE RAILWAY STATION DATASET

2021 ◽  
Vol XLIII-B3-2021 ◽  
pp. 223-228
Author(s):  
Y. A. Lumban-Gaol ◽  
Z. Chen ◽  
M. Smit ◽  
X. Li ◽  
M. A. Erbaşu ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Neural Networks ◽  
Point Cloud ◽  
Semantic Segmentation ◽  
Point Clouds ◽  
Railway Station ◽  
Train Station ◽  
Cloud Data ◽  
Indoor Scenes ◽  
Segmentation Problem

Abstract. Point cloud data have rich semantic representations and can benefit various applications towards a digital twin. However, they are unordered and anisotropically distributed, thus being unsuitable for a typical Convolutional Neural Networks (CNN) to handle. With the advance of deep learning, several neural networks claim to have solved the point cloud semantic segmentation problem. This paper evaluates three different neural networks for semantic segmentation of point clouds, namely PointNet++, PointCNN and DGCNN. A public indoor scene of the Amersfoort railway station is used as the study area. Unlike the typical indoor scenes and even more from the ubiquitous outdoor ones in currently available datasets, the station consists of objects such as the entrance gates, ticket machines, couches, and garbage cans. For the experiment, we use subsets from the data, remove the noise, evaluate the performance of the selected neural networks. The results indicate an overall accuracy of more than 90% for all the networks but vary in terms of mean class accuracy and mean Intersection over Union (IoU). The misclassification mainly occurs in the classes of couch and garbage can. Several factors that may contribute to the errors are analyzed, such as the quality of the data and the proportion of the number of points per class. The adaptability of the networks is also heavily dependent on the training location: the overall characteristics of the train station make a trained network for one location less suitable for another.

scholarly journals Point Cloud Coding Solutions, Subjective Assessment and Objective Measures: A Case Study

Symmetry ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (12) ◽  
pp. 1955
Author(s):  
Emil Dumic ◽  
Luis A. da Silva Cruz
Keyword(s):  
Point Cloud ◽  
Point Clouds ◽  
Quality Measures ◽  
Subjective Assessment ◽  
Subjective Quality ◽  
Point Cloud Data ◽  
Cloud Data ◽  
Objective Quality

This paper presents a summary of recent progress in compression, subjective assessment and objective quality measures of point cloud representations of three dimensional visual information. Different existing point cloud datasets, as well as discusses the protocols that have been proposed to evaluate the subjective quality of point cloud data. Several geometry and attribute point cloud data objective quality measures are also presented and described. A case study on the evaluation of subjective quality of point clouds in two laboratories is presented. Six original point clouds degraded with G-PCC and V-PCC point cloud compression and five degradation levels were subjectively evaluated, showing high inter-laboratory correlation. Furthermore, performance of several geometry-based objective quality measures applied to the same data are described, concluding that the highest correlation with subjective scores is obtained using point-to-plane measures. Finally, several current challenges and future research directions on point clouds compression and quality evaluation are discussed.

scholarly journals 3D GEOLOGICAL OUTCROP CHARACTERIZATION: AUTOMATIC DETECTION OF 3D PLANES (AZIMUTH AND DIP) USING LiDAR POINT CLOUDS

2016 ◽  
Vol III-5 ◽  
pp. 105-112 ◽  
Author(s):  
K. Anders ◽  
M. Hämmerle ◽  
G. Miernik ◽  
T. Drews ◽  
A. Escalona ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Spatial Resolution ◽  
Point Cloud ◽  
Laser Scanning ◽  
Spatial Information ◽  
Point Clouds ◽  
Rock Surface ◽  
Cloud Data ◽  
Surface Data ◽  
Data Volume

Terrestrial laser scanning constitutes a powerful method in spatial information data acquisition and allows for geological outcrops to be captured with high resolution and accuracy. A crucial aspect for numerous geologic applications is the extraction of rock surface orientations from the data. This paper focuses on the detection of planes in rock surface data by applying a segmentation algorithm directly to a 3D point cloud. Its performance is assessed considering (1) reduced spatial resolution of data and (2) smoothing in the course of data pre-processing. The methodology is tested on simulations of progressively reduced spatial resolution defined by varying point cloud density. Smoothing of the point cloud data is implemented by modifying the neighborhood criteria during normals estima-tion. The considerable alteration of resulting planes emphasizes the influence of smoothing on the plane detection prior to the actual segmentation. Therefore, the parameter needs to be set in accordance with individual purposes and respective scales of studies. Fur-thermore, it is concluded that the quality of segmentation results does not decline even when the data volume is significantly reduced down to 10%. The azimuth and dip values of individual segments are determined for planes fit to the points belonging to one segment. Based on these results, azimuth and dip as well as strike character of the surface planes in the outcrop are assessed. Thereby, this paper contributes to a fully automatic and straightforward workflow for a comprehensive geometric description of outcrops in 3D.

scholarly journals An Automatic Tree Skeleton Extraction Approach Based on Multi-View Slicing Using Terrestrial LiDAR Scans Data

2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (22) ◽  
pp. 3824
Author(s):  
Mingyao Ai ◽  
Yuan Yao ◽  
Qingwu Hu ◽  
Yue Wang ◽  
Wei Wang
Keyword(s):  
Point Cloud ◽  
Mean Shift ◽  
Principal Component ◽  
Point Clouds ◽  
Skeleton Extraction ◽  
Tree Reconstruction ◽  
Terrestrial Lidar ◽  
Cloud Data ◽  
Critical Technology ◽  
X Ray Computed

Effective 3D tree reconstruction based on point clouds from terrestrial Light Detection and Ranging (LiDAR) scans (TLS) has been widely recognized as a critical technology in forestry and ecology modeling. The major advantages of using TLS lie in its rapidly and automatically capturing tree information at millimeter level, providing massive high-density data. In addition, TLS 3D tree reconstruction allows for occlusions and complex structures from the derived point cloud of trees to be obtained. In this paper, an automatic tree skeleton extraction approach based on multi-view slicing is proposed to improve the TLS 3D tree reconstruction, which borrowed the idea from the medical imaging technology of X-ray computed tomography. Firstly, we extracted the precise trunk center and then cut the point cloud of the tree into slices. Next, the skeleton from each slice was generated using the kernel mean shift and principal component analysis algorithms. Accordingly, these isolated skeletons were smoothed and morphologically synthetized. Finally, the validation in point clouds of two trees acquired from multi-view TLS further demonstrated the potential of the proposed framework in efficiently dealing with TLS point cloud data.

scholarly journals Integration of Constructive Solid Geometry and Boundary Representation (CSG-BRep) for 3D Modeling of Underground Cable Wells from Point Clouds

2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (9) ◽  
pp. 1452
Author(s):  
Ming Huang ◽  
Xueyu Wu ◽  
Xianglei Liu ◽  
Tianhang Meng ◽  
Peiyuan Zhu
Keyword(s):  
Point Cloud ◽  
Three Dimensional ◽  
Point Clouds ◽  
Adaptive Method ◽  
Boundary Representation ◽  
Point Cloud Data ◽  
Terrestrial Lidar ◽  
Cloud Data ◽  
Underground Cable ◽  
3D Information

The preference of three-dimensional representation of underground cable wells from two-dimensional symbols is a developing trend, and three-dimensional (3D) point cloud data is widely used due to its high precision. In this study, we utilize the characteristics of 3D terrestrial lidar point cloud data to build a CSG-BRep 3D model of underground cable wells, whose spatial topological relationship is fully considered. In order to simplify the modeling process, first, point cloud simplification is performed; then, the point cloud main axis is extracted by OBB bounding box, and lastly the point cloud orientation correction is realized by quaternion rotation. Furthermore, employing the adaptive method, the top point cloud is extracted, and it is projected for boundary extraction. Thereupon, utilizing the boundary information, we design the 3D cable well model. Finally, the cable well component model is generated by scanning the original point cloud. The experiments demonstrate that, along with the algorithm being fast, the proposed model is effective at displaying the 3D information of the actual cable wells and meets the current production demands.

scholarly journals EXPLORING REGULARITIES FOR IMPROVING FAÇADE RECONSTRUCTION FROM POINT CLOUDS

2016 ◽  
Vol XLI-B5 ◽  
pp. 749-755
Author(s):  
K. Zhou ◽  
B. Gorte ◽  
S. Zlatanova
Keyword(s):  
Point Cloud ◽  
Feature Space ◽  
Point Clouds ◽  
Poor Quality ◽  
Second Phase ◽  
Terrestrial Lidar ◽  
Transformation Matrices ◽  
Two Phases ◽  
Reconstructed Model

(Semi)-automatic facade reconstruction from terrestrial LiDAR point clouds is often affected by both quality of point cloud itself and imperfectness of object recognition algorithms. In this paper, we employ regularities, which exist on façades, to mitigate these problems. For example, doors, windows and balconies often have orthogonal and parallel boundaries. Many windows are constructed with the same shape. They may be arranged at the same lines and distance intervals, so do different windows. By identifying regularities among objects with relatively poor quality, these can be applied to calibrate the objects and improve their quality. The paper focuses on the regularities among the windows, which is the majority of objects on the wall. Regularities are classified into three categories: within an individual window, among similar windows and among different windows. Nine cases are specified as a reference for exploration. A hierarchical clustering method is employed to identify and apply regularities in a feature space, where regularities can be identified from clusters. To find the corresponding features in the nine cases of regularities, two phases are distinguished for similar and different windows. In the first phase, ICP (iterative closest points) is used to identify groups of similar windows. The registered points and a number of transformation matrices are used to identify and apply regularities among similar windows. In the second phase, features are extracted from the boundaries of the different windows. When applying regularities by relocating windows, the connections, called chains, established among the similar windows in the first phase are preserved. To test the performance of the algorithms, two datasets from terrestrial LiDAR point clouds are used. Both show good effects on the reconstructed model, while still matching with original point cloud, preventing over or under-regularization.

scholarly journals 3D GEOLOGICAL OUTCROP CHARACTERIZATION: AUTOMATIC DETECTION OF 3D PLANES (AZIMUTH AND DIP) USING LiDAR POINT CLOUDS

2016 ◽  
Vol III-5 ◽  
pp. 105-112 ◽  
Author(s):  
K. Anders ◽  
M. Hämmerle ◽  
G. Miernik ◽  
T. Drews ◽  
A. Escalona ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Spatial Resolution ◽  
Point Cloud ◽  
Laser Scanning ◽  
Spatial Information ◽  
Point Clouds ◽  
Rock Surface ◽  
Cloud Data ◽  
Surface Data ◽  
Data Volume

Terrestrial laser scanning constitutes a powerful method in spatial information data acquisition and allows for geological outcrops to be captured with high resolution and accuracy. A crucial aspect for numerous geologic applications is the extraction of rock surface orientations from the data. This paper focuses on the detection of planes in rock surface data by applying a segmentation algorithm directly to a 3D point cloud. Its performance is assessed considering (1) reduced spatial resolution of data and (2) smoothing in the course of data pre-processing. The methodology is tested on simulations of progressively reduced spatial resolution defined by varying point cloud density. Smoothing of the point cloud data is implemented by modifying the neighborhood criteria during normals estima-tion. The considerable alteration of resulting planes emphasizes the influence of smoothing on the plane detection prior to the actual segmentation. Therefore, the parameter needs to be set in accordance with individual purposes and respective scales of studies. Fur-thermore, it is concluded that the quality of segmentation results does not decline even when the data volume is significantly reduced down to 10%. The azimuth and dip values of individual segments are determined for planes fit to the points belonging to one segment. Based on these results, azimuth and dip as well as strike character of the surface planes in the outcrop are assessed. Thereby, this paper contributes to a fully automatic and straightforward workflow for a comprehensive geometric description of outcrops in 3D.

scholarly journals EXPLORING REGULARITIES FOR IMPROVING FAÇADE RECONSTRUCTION FROM POINT CLOUDS

2016 ◽  
Vol XLI-B5 ◽  
pp. 749-755 ◽  
Author(s):  
K. Zhou ◽  
B. Gorte ◽  
S. Zlatanova
Keyword(s):  
Point Cloud ◽  
Feature Space ◽  
Point Clouds ◽  
Poor Quality ◽  
Second Phase ◽  
Terrestrial Lidar ◽  
Transformation Matrices ◽  
Two Phases ◽  
Reconstructed Model

(Semi)-automatic facade reconstruction from terrestrial LiDAR point clouds is often affected by both quality of point cloud itself and imperfectness of object recognition algorithms. In this paper, we employ regularities, which exist on façades, to mitigate these problems. For example, doors, windows and balconies often have orthogonal and parallel boundaries. Many windows are constructed with the same shape. They may be arranged at the same lines and distance intervals, so do different windows. By identifying regularities among objects with relatively poor quality, these can be applied to calibrate the objects and improve their quality. The paper focuses on the regularities among the windows, which is the majority of objects on the wall. Regularities are classified into three categories: within an individual window, among similar windows and among different windows. Nine cases are specified as a reference for exploration. A hierarchical clustering method is employed to identify and apply regularities in a feature space, where regularities can be identified from clusters. To find the corresponding features in the nine cases of regularities, two phases are distinguished for similar and different windows. In the first phase, ICP (iterative closest points) is used to identify groups of similar windows. The registered points and a number of transformation matrices are used to identify and apply regularities among similar windows. In the second phase, features are extracted from the boundaries of the different windows. When applying regularities by relocating windows, the connections, called chains, established among the similar windows in the first phase are preserved. To test the performance of the algorithms, two datasets from terrestrial LiDAR point clouds are used. Both show good effects on the reconstructed model, while still matching with original point cloud, preventing over or under-regularization.

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