Tracking a real aerial view with Google Earth data

In this video you first see a standard tracking : once the golf course is calibrated by hand on one frame on the video, it is tracked over the video. Well, it would be far nicer to be able to do the calibration before flying, wouldn't it ? So the second part shows a calibration done with a view taken from Google Earth. This way you can imagine you can calibrate the tracking without any video signal and be ready when the camera in the blimp switches on. The result is not perfect but not so bad ! In particular, notice that the temporary buildings that appear during the competition in the video are not there in the Google Earth view.

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• Augmented
• Reality
• Mixed
• Tracking
• Total
• Immersion

[roidroid]

you opened up Google Earth and took a screenshot, yes?

I'm having trouble figuring out what you used Google Earth for, even from the description

[EmmanuelMFr]

Yes I took a screenshot. I imported it in my calibration tool. I superimposed the virtual golf course over the Google Earth screenshot. And then you see the tracking on the real video with this data. I added some words in the description to try to be more meaningful.

[roidroid]

ah i see now.

You would normally need aerial shots to do your calibrations. But by using Google Earth to fly virtually, you can do your calibrations using the virtual aerial shots instead.

[EmmanuelMFr]

That's it. The idea is that you simply cannot ask a blimp to go anywhere at will in order to prepare your tracking over a large area, while you can do anything you want with Google Earth. Alas, with all the crowds, the temporary buildings, etc., that appear during events, it is not straightforward. So, although Google Earth can provide rough calibration, there still will be needs for final calibration done on the fly, in my opinion.

[twdarkflame]

Nice work. I see a lot of potential in this.

I think as systems like google earth will be increaseingly usefull for AR as their datasets expand...particularly with 3D data, allowing outdoor tracking easier. I see Microsoft Photosyth and varents potentialy being very usefull as well. (gps on the device gets rough location, compass gives facing direction, then using a pointmap of local buildings could give a precise location and tracking...with some very complex software, of course)

[Meteotrance]

pas mal cette maniére de faire du tracking c'est vraiment à creusé comme idée les architectes apréciront, mais c sur qu'avec votre system temp réel ca pourrait être révolutionnaire.