Studies on Three-Dimensional (3D) Modeling of UAV Oblique Imagery with the Aid of Loop-Shooting

• Main Authors: Jia Li, Yongxiang Yao, Ping Duan, Yun Chen, Shuang Li, Chi Zhang
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: MDPI AG 2018-08-01
• Series: ISPRS International Journal of Geo-Information
• Subjects: oblique imagery; aerotriangulation; three-dimensional (3D) modeling; loop-shooting-aided; 3D scene information compensation
• Online Access: http://www.mdpi.com/2220-9964/7/9/356

Oblique imagery obtained from an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) has been widely applied to large-scale three-dimensional (3D) reconstruction; however, the problems of partially missing model details caused by such factors as occlusion, distortion, and airflow, are still not well resolved. In this paper, a loop-shooting-aided technology is used to solve the problem of details loss in the 3D model. The use of loop-shooting technology can effectively compensate for losses caused by occlusion, distortion, or airflow during UAV flight and enhance the 3D model details in large scene- modeling applications. Applying this technology involves two key steps. First, based on the 3D modeling construction process, the missing details of the modeling scene are found. Second, using loop-shooting image sets as the data source, incremental iterative fitting based on aerotriangulation theory is used to compensate for the missing details in the 3D model. The experimental data used in this paper were collected from Yunnan Normal University, Chenggong District, Kunming City, Yunnan Province, China. The experiments demonstrate that loop-shooting significantly improves the aerotriangulation accuracy and effectively compensates for defects during 3D large-scale model reconstruction. In standard-scale distance tests, the average relative accuracy of our modeling algorithm reached 99.87% and achieved good results. Therefore, this technique not only optimizes the model accuracy and ensures model integrity, but also simplifies the process of refining the 3D model. This study can be useful as a reference and as scientific guidance in large-scale stereo measurements, cultural heritage protection, and smart city construction.