Monocular depth perception by evaluation of the blur in defocused images

We present a range sensing method based on monocular computer vision. The method exploits the physical effect that the imaging properties of an optical system depend on the acquisition parameters and the object distance. Basic principle is to compare the blur in a couple of defocused images of the same scene, taken with different apertures (depth-from-defocus). Our approach is working along the edges, but not restricted to ideal step edges