Accurate, Dense, and Robust Multi-View Stereopsis

This paper proposes a novel algorithm for calibrated multi-view stereopsis that outputs a (quasi) dense set of rectangular patches covering the surfaces visible in the input images. This algorithm does not require any initialization in the form of a bounding volume, and it detects and discards automatically outliers and obstacles. It does not perform any smoothing across nearby features, yet is currently the top performer in terms of both coverage and accuracy for four of the six benchmark datasets presented in [20]. The keys to its performance are effective techniques for enforcing local photometric consistency and global visibility constraints. Stereopsis is implemented as a match, expand, and filter procedure, starting from a sparse set of matched keypoints, and repeatedly expanding these to nearby pixel correspondences before using visibility constraints to filter away false matches. A simple but effective method for turning the resulting patch model into a mesh appropriate for image-based modeling is also presented. The proposed approach is demonstrated on various datasets including objects with fine surface details, deep concavities, and thin structures, outdoor scenes observed from a restricted set of viewpoints, and "crowded" scenes where moving obstacles appear in different places in multiple images of a static structure of interest.