Recognising panoramas

The problem considered in this paper is the fully automatic construction of panoramas. Fundamentally, this problem requires recognition, as we need to know which parts of the panorama join up. Previous approaches have used human input or restrictions on the image sequence for the matching step. In this work we use object recognition techniques based on invariant local features to select matching images, and a probabilistic model for verification. Because of this our method is insensitive to the ordering, orientation, scale and illumination of the images. It is also insensitive to 'noise' images which are not part of the panorama at all, that is, it recognises panoramas. This suggests a useful application for photographers: the system takes as input the images on an entire flash card or film, recognises images that form part of a panorama, and stitches them with no user input whatsoever.