Robust estimation of planar regions for visual navigation using sequential stereo images

In this paper, we propose a robust method to estimate planar regions using sequential stereo images for visual navigation of an autonomous vehicle. The proposed method estimates 2D projective transformations dynamically, which represent planes in space, for both stereo images and sequential images. This can be done robustly by utilizing sequential information, i.e. previous estimation of both the projective transformations and the corresponding planar region. In addition, a method for preventing misdetection due to textureless areas is proposed. The experimental results, using sequential stereo images taken from a moving vehicle, have shown that the proposed method can work robustly even in the conditions of undulation of the road and rolling and pitching of the vehicle