SBIR Phase II: Visualization Toolkit for 3D Photography

This Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase II project seeks to develop a comprehensive 3D photography toolkit for importing the geometry of existing large-scale urban structures into the computer. The goal of the project is to minimize the effort of building models of high geometric and photometric accuracy that are suitable for efficient rendering, manipulation, and analysis. The proposed Phase II work will build upon the feasibility study conducted in Phase I. The Phase I effort introduced a novel algorithm that successfully integrated multiview geometry with automated 3D registration to produce realistic visualizations of complex, reconstructed, real-world 3D models with minimal human interaction. The goal is to build approximate lightweight 3D models directly from a collection of photographs of the scene. The proposed workflow treats a photograph as tracing paper upon which 2D shapes are defined prior to extruding them into 3D models. The commercial application of this Phase II project is the introduction of a comprehensive software toolkit for 3D photography. The ultimate goal is the reconstruction and visualization of detailed models of urban sites, i.e. digital cities. The creation of digital cities drives other areas of research as well: visualization of very large data sets, creation of model databases for GIS (Geographical Information Systems) and combination of reconstructed areas with existing digital maps. Other applications include video game development, entertainment, architecture, virtual tourism, fire/police/urban planning, urban design, disaster prevention, archaeology, and historical preservation.