VASC Seminar: Free Space computation using Stochastic Occupancy Grids and Dynamic Programming

Hernán Badino
Goethe Frankfurt University (Germany)
Monday March 31 @ 3:30pm

Abstract--The computation of free space available in an environment is an essential task for many intelligent automotive and robotic applications. In this talk, I propose a new approach, which builds a stochastic occupancy grid to address the free space problem as a dynamic programming task. Stereo measurements are integrated over time reducing disparity uncertainty. These integrated measurements are entered into an occupancy grid, taking into account the noise properties of the measurements. In order to cope with real-time requirements of the application, three occupancy grid types are proposed. Their applicabilities and implementations are also discussed. Experimental results with real stereo sequences show the robustness and accuracy of the method. The current implementation of the method runs on off-the-shelf hardware at 20 Hz.

Bio--Hernán Badino received his degree of Engineer from the National Technological University, Córdoba, Argentina, in 2002. He is at the moment presenting his doctoral thesis at the J. W. Goethe Frankfurt University, Germany. Mr. Badino has worked during his PhD. D with the Image Based Environment Perception Group at Daimler AG, in Stuttgart, Germany. He is currently member of the Visual Sensorics and Information Processing Group, at the Frankfurt University, engaged in a project of camera-based urban traffic sensing for driver assistance systems. Mr. Badino particular research interests in the area of computer vision include the computation of ego-motion from sequences of stereo images and the development of stereo vision algorithms for the real-time detection and tracking of static and moving objects for automotive applications.