Patent Application
20200372604
This disclosure relates to image stitching, and more specifically, to generating a spherical image from multiple sub-images.
Spherical images are typically obtained by capturing multiple images with overlapping fields of view from different cameras and combining the images together. Conventional stitching algorithms may result in undesirable artifacts around the stitch lines due to imperfections in the stitching process. These artifacts may be exacerbated by distortion introduced in the original pre-stitched images when the images are projected to rectangular images.
The disclosed embodiments have other advantages and features which will be more readily apparent from the following detailed description of the invention and the appended claims, when taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings, in which:
Figure (or “FIG.”) 1 illustrates an example embodiment of a spherical camera system.
The figures and the following description relate to preferred embodiments by way of illustration only. It should be noted that from the following discussion, alternative embodiments of the structures and methods disclosed herein will be readily recognized as viable alternatives that may be employed without departing from the principles of what is claimed.
Reference will now be made in detail to several embodiments, examples of which are illustrated in the accompanying figures. It is noted that wherever practicable similar or like reference numbers may be used in the figures and may indicate similar or like functionality. The figures depict embodiments of the disclosed system (or method) for purposes of illustration only. One skilled in the art will readily recognize from the following description that alternative embodiments of the structures and methods illustrated herein may be employed without departing from the principles described herein.
A pair of hyper-hemispherical images may be combined to generate a rectangular projection of a spherical image having an equatorial stitch line along of a line of lowest distortion in the two images. A first circular image may be received corresponding to first hyper-hemispherical field of view capturing by a first camera facing a first direction and second circular image may be received corresponding to second hyper-hemispherical field of view captured by a second camera facing a second direction opposite the first direction. A video processing device may project the first circular image to a first rectangular image by mapping an outer edge of the first circular image to a bottom edge of the first rectangular image and mapping a center point of the first circular image to a top edge of the first rectangular image. The video processing device may project the second circular image to a second rectangular image by mapping an outer edge of the second circular image to a top edge of the second rectangular image and mapping a center point of the second circular image to a bottom edge of the second rectangular image. The bottom edge of the first rectangular image may be stitched with the top edge of the second rectangular image to generate the rectangular projection of the spherical image.
The processes described herein may be performed by a video processing system comprising a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium and at least one processor. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium stores instructions that when executed cause the at least one processor to perform the processes described herein. In an embodiment, the video processing system may be partially or wholly implemented in the camera 100 or may be implemented partially or wholly in an external device.
A first circular image (e.g., image “A”) 250 and a second circular image (e.g., image “B”) 260 may be received at a video processing system. The first circular image 250 may represent, for example, the field of view captured by a first camera 110 (e.g., a front-facing camera) of a spherical camera system 100 and the second circular image 260 may represent, for example, the field of view captured by the second camera 120 (e.g., a rear-facing camera) of a spherical camera system 100. The images 250, 260 are circular because they represent the entire fields of view seen by the respective cameras 110, 120 as opposed to a cropped rectangular field of view captured by a traditional camera. In an embodiment, the circular images 250, 260 may be captured by using only a circular region of a respective square or rectangular image sensor 252, 262. Alternatively, the circular images 250, 260 may be captured using respective circular image sensors. The circular images 250, 260 may each represent a hyper-hemispherical field of view (e.g., n degrees greater than a hemisphere in at least one direction). Thus there may be some overlap in the respective fields of view near the edges of the images 250, 260. This overlap can be used to align features for stitching as will be described in further detail below.
The first circular image 250 and the second circular image 260 may be projected to a first equi-rectangular image 254 and a second equi-rectangular image 264 respectively, using equi-rectangular projections. In these projections, the circular images 250, 260 may each be stretched horizontally to fill a square. As a result of this project, the equi-rectangular images 254, 264 may become increasingly more distorted as the top and bottom edges are approached. For example, the center row of pixels may not undergo any stretching during the projection, while the top and bottom row in the original circular image (which may each be represented by a respective single pixel) may be stretched to fill the entire top and bottom rows respectively of the equi-rectangular projections 254, 264. The resulting equi-rectangular images 254, 264 each may comprise an image representing a 180 degree field of view along the vertical axis and represent a 180+2n degree field of view along the horizontal axis, where n represents the degree of overlap between the fields of view of the original images 250, 260. For example, the first equi-rectangular image 254 may comprise a field of view in the range of 0−n degrees to 180+n degrees and the second equi-rectangular image 264 may comprise a field of view in the range of 180−n degrees to 360+n degrees along the horizontal axis.
The second image 264 may then be split 206 into a first sub-image 266 (e.g., a left sub-image) and a second sub-image (e.g., a right sub-image) 268. For example, the second image 264 may be divided vertically into two equal-sized sub-images 266, 268 in which the left sub-image 266 may represent the field of view 180−n degrees to 270 degrees and the right sub-image 268 may represent the field of view 270 degrees to 360+n degrees. The left sub-image 266 may then be stitched 208 to the right side of the first image 254 (e.g., by aligning features appearing in the n overlapping degrees near the left edge of the left-sub-image 266 with the features in the n overlapping degrees near the right edge of the first image 254), and the right sub-image 268 may be stitched 208 to the left side of the first image 254 (e.g., by aligning features appearing in the n overlapping degrees near the right edge of the right-sub-image 268 with the features in the n overlapping degrees near the left edge of the first image 254). The resulting image 270 (referred to herein as an “equatorial view” of the spherical image) provides a useful rectangular projection of the spherical field of view in which the center portion of the image 270 corresponds to the image 250 captured by the front-facing camera 110 and the left and right edges of the image 270 may correspond to the image 260 captured by the rear-facing camera 120. This orientation of the spherical image may be useful because many existing viewing and editing applications for spherical images assume that an image is received in this orientation.
An advantage of the method of
A first circular image 350 and a second circular image 360 may be received 302 at a video processing system, which may be similar to the first circular image 250 and second circular image 260 respectively discussed above. The first circular image 350 and the second circular image 360 may be projected 304 to a first rectangular image 352 and a second rectangular image 362 respectively. Here, instead of using a conventional equi-rectangular projection, a projection may instead be used in which the outer edge of the circular image 350, 360 maps to a first horizontal edge of the rectangular image 352, 362 and a center point of the circular image 350, 360 maps to a second horizontal edge of the rectangular image 352, 362. Particularly, in the projection of the first circular image 350, the center point of the first circular image 350 maps to a top edge of the rectangular image 352 and the outer edge of the first circular image 350 maps to the bottom edge of the rectangular image 352. This projection may also be understood as taking increasing larger concentric rings of pixels from the circular image 350 and arranging them in rows (e.g., forming a triangle in which the center point represents the vertex of the triangle and the outer most ring represents the base of the triangle), which are then stretched to fill the rectangle. In this projection, the distortion in the rectangular image 352 due to stretching of the pixels increases near the top edge of the first rectangular image 352. Particularly, along the top edge, a single pixel (representing the center point of the original first circular image) may be stretched across the entire top edge, while along the bottom edge, no stretching may be performed. This may result in a rectangular image 352 representing a field of view from 0−n degrees to 90 degrees along the vertical axis (corresponding to the angles from the outer edge to the center point of the original circular image 350) and from 0 degrees to 360 degrees along the horizontal axis (corresponding to the angles around the circumference of the original circular image 350. In the projection of the second circular image 360, the center point of the second circular image 360 may be mapped to a bottom edge of the second rectangular image 362 and the outer edge of the second circular image 360 may be mapped to the top edge of the second rectangular image 360. Particularly, along the bottom edge of the second rectangular image 362, a single pixel (representing the center point of the original second circular image 360) may be stretched across the entire bottom edge, while along the top edge, no stretching may be performed.
The first rectangular image 352 and the second rectangular image 362 may then be stitched 306 together (e.g., by aligning the n overlapping degrees of the bottom edge of the first rectangular image 352 with the top edge of the second rectangular image 362). The resulting image 370 may be referred to as “polar view” of a spherical image. The stitch line may be referred to as an “equatorial stitch” because the stitched edges may correspond to an equator between the two hemispheres captured by the cameras 110, 120. As can be seen, in contrast to the stitching technique of
The resulting stitched image 370 in the polar view may be converted to the equatorial view of
In this process, the stitched image 370 may be divided 402 into left and right equally-sized sub-images 452, 454. The left sub-image 452 may be rotated 404 clockwise 90 degrees and the right sub-image 454 may be rotated 404 counterclockwise 90 degrees. The rotated left sub-image 456 and the rotated right sub-image 458 may be re-combined 406 (e.g., by aligning the right edge of the rotated left sub-image 406 with the left edge of the rotated right sub-image 408) to generate the re-orientated image 410. This re-orientation may be useful to enable the spherical image to be processed using the same editing or viewing tools designed for use with the projection of
The computing system 500 can be used to execute instructions 524 (e.g., program code or software) for causing the computing system 500 to perform any one or more of the methodologies (or processes) described herein. In alternative embodiments, the computing system 500 operates as a standalone device or a connected (e.g., networked) device that connects to other computer systems. The computing system 500 may comprise, for example, a personal computer (PC), a tablet PC, a smart watch, or other device capable of executing instructions 524 (sequential or otherwise) that specify actions to be taken. In another embodiment, the computing system 500 may comprise a server. In a networked deployment, the computing system 500 may operate in the capacity of a server or client in a server-client network environment, or as a peer device in a peer-to-peer (or distributed) network environment. Further, while only a single computer system 500 is illustrated, a plurality of computing systems 500 may operate to jointly execute instructions 524 to perform any one or more of the methodologies discussed herein.
The example computing system 500 includes one or more processing units (generally processor 502). The processor 502 is, for example, a central processing unit (CPU), a graphics processing unit (GPU), a digital signal processor (DSP), a controller, a state machine, one or more application specific integrated circuits (ASICs), one or more radio-frequency integrated circuits (RFICs), or any combination of these. The computing system 500 also includes a main memory 504. The computing system 500 may include a storage unit 516. The processor 502, memory 504 and the storage unit 516 communicate via a bus 508.
In addition, the computing system 500 can include a static memory 506, a display driver 510 (e.g., to drive a plasma display panel (PDP), a liquid crystal display (LCD), or a projector). The computing system 500 may also include input/output devices, e.g., an alphanumeric input device 512 (e.g., touch screen-based keypad or an external input device such as a keyboard), a dimensional (e.g., 2-D or 3-D) control device 514 (e.g., a touch screen or external input device such as a mouse, a trackball, a joystick, a motion sensor, or other pointing instrument), a signal generation device 518 (e.g., a speaker), and a network interface device 520, which also are configured to communicate via the bus 508. Embodiments of the computing system 500 corresponding to a client device may include a different configuration than an embodiment of the computing system 500 corresponding to a server. For example, an embodiment corresponding to a server may include a larger storage unit 516, more memory 504, and a faster processor 502 but may lack the display driver 510, input device 512, and dimensional control device 514.
The storage unit 516 includes a computer-readable medium 311 on which is stored instructions 524 (e.g., software) embodying any one or more of the methodologies or functions described herein. The instructions 524 may also reside, completely or at least partially, within the main memory 504 or within the processor 502 (e.g., within a processor's cache memory) during execution thereof by the computing system 500, the main memory 504 and the processor 502 also constituting computer-readable media. The instructions 524 may be transmitted or received over a network 526 via the network interface device 520.
While computer-readable medium 522 is shown in an example embodiment to be a single medium, the term “computer-readable medium” should be taken to include a single medium or multiple media (e.g., a centralized or distributed database, or associated caches and servers) able to store the instructions 524. The term “computer-readable medium” shall also be taken to include any medium that is capable of storing instructions 524 for execution by the computing system 500 and that cause the computing system 500 to perform any one or more of the methodologies disclosed herein. The term “computer-readable medium” includes, but not be limited to, data repositories in the form of solid-state memories, optical media, and magnetic media.
Throughout this specification, plural instances may implement components, operations, or structures described as a single instance. Although individual operations of one or more methods are illustrated and described as separate operations, one or more of the individual operations may be performed concurrently, and nothing requires that the operations be performed in the order illustrated. Structures and functionality presented as separate components in example configurations may be implemented as a combined structure or component. Similarly, structures and functionality presented as a single component may be implemented as separate components. These and other variations, modifications, additions, and improvements fall within the scope of the subject matter herein.
Unless specifically stated otherwise, discussions herein using words such as “processing,” “computing,” “calculating,” “determining,” “presenting,” “displaying,” or the like may refer to actions or processes of a machine (e.g., a computer) that manipulates or transforms data represented as physical (e.g., electronic, magnetic, or optical) quantities within one or more memories (e.g., volatile memory, non-volatile memory, or a combination thereof), registers, or other machine components that receive, store, transmit, or display information.
As used herein any reference to “one embodiment” or “an embodiment” means that a particular element, feature, structure, or characteristic described in connection with the embodiment is included in at least one embodiment. The appearances of the phrase “in one embodiment” in various places in the specification are not necessarily all referring to the same embodiment.
Some embodiments may be described using the expression “coupled” and “connected” along with their derivatives. For example, some embodiments may be described using the term “coupled” to indicate that two or more elements are in direct physical or electrical contact. The term “coupled,” however, may also mean that two or more elements are not in direct contact with each other, but yet still co-operate or interact with each other. The embodiments are not limited in this context.
As used herein, the terms “comprises,” “comprising,” “includes,” “including,” “has,” “having” or any other variation thereof, are intended to cover a non-exclusive inclusion. For example, a process, method, article, or apparatus that comprises a list of elements is not necessarily limited to only those elements but may include other elements not expressly listed or inherent to such process, method, article, or apparatus. Further, unless expressly stated to the contrary, “or” refers to an inclusive or and not to an exclusive or. For example, a condition A or B is satisfied by any one of the following: A is true (or present) and B is false (or not present), A is false (or not present) and B is true (or present), and both A and B are true (or present).
In addition, use of the “a” or “an” are employed to describe elements and components of the embodiments herein. This is done merely for convenience and to give a general sense of the invention. This description should be read to include one or at least one and the singular also includes the plural unless it is obvious that it is meant otherwise.
Upon reading this disclosure, those of skill in the art will appreciate still additional alternative structural and functional designs for a system and a process for the embodiments herein through the disclosed principles. Thus, while particular embodiments and applications have been illustrated and described, it is to be understood that the disclosed embodiments are not limited to the precise construction and components disclosed herein. Various apparent modifications, changes, and variations may be made in the arrangement, operation and details of the method and apparatus disclosed herein without departing from the scope defined in the appended claims.
This application claims the benefit of U.S. Provisional Application No. 62/204,290 filed on Aug. 12, 2015, the contents of which are incorporated by reference herein.
| Number | Date | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 62204290 | Aug 2015 | US |
| Number | Date | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Parent | 16450672 | Jun 2019 | US |
| Child | 16871762 | US | |
| Parent | 16056370 | Aug 2018 | US |
| Child | 16450672 | US | |
| Parent | 15234869 | Aug 2016 | US |
| Child | 16056370 | US |
