Self-optimizing loop sifting and majorization for 3D reconstruction

TL;DR

This paper introduces an adaptive, threshold-free loop sifting and majorization algorithm for 3D reconstruction that improves loop detection accuracy in vSLAM systems, enhancing performance across various sensors and datasets.

Contribution

The proposed algorithm automatically evaluates and accepts loops without user-defined thresholds, improving robustness and applicability in diverse 3D reconstruction scenarios.

Findings

Outperforms state-of-the-art methods on public datasets

Automatically assesses loop usefulness using dense map posterior metric

Compatible with various sensors and SLAM systems

Abstract

Visual simultaneous localization and mapping (vSLAM) and 3D reconstruction methods have gone through impressive progress. These methods are very promising for autonomous vehicle and consumer robot applications because they can map large-scale environments such as cities and indoor environments without the need for much human effort. However, when it comes to loop detection and optimization, there is still room for improvement. vSLAM systems tend to add the loops very conservatively to reduce the severe influence of the false loops. These conservative checks usually lead to correct loops rejected, thus decrease performance. In this paper, an algorithm that can sift and majorize loop detections is proposed. Our proposed algorithm can compare the usefulness and effectiveness of different loops with the dense map posterior (DMP) metric. The algorithm tests and decides the acceptance of each loop without a single user-defined threshold. Thus it is adaptive to different data conditions. The proposed method is general and agnostic to sensor type (as long as depth or LiDAR reading presents), loop detection, and optimization methods. Neither does it require a specific type of SLAM system. Thus it has great potential to be applied to various application scenarios. Experiments are conducted on public datasets. Results show that the proposed method outperforms state-of-the-art methods.