L2E: Lasers to Events for 6-DoF Extrinsic Calibration of Lidars and Event Cameras

TL;DR

This paper introduces a novel direct calibration method for aligning event cameras with lidars, leveraging the high temporal resolution of event cameras to improve 6-DoF extrinsic calibration without relying on frame-based cameras or manual measurements.

Contribution

It presents the first direct calibration approach between event cameras and lidars, utilizing their high dynamic range and low latency for improved accuracy.

Findings

First direct calibration method for event cameras and lidars

Eliminates need for frame-based camera intermediaries

Uses information-based correlation for optimization

Abstract

As neuromorphic technology is maturing, its application to robotics and autonomous vehicle systems has become an area of active research. In particular, event cameras have emerged as a compelling alternative to frame-based cameras in low-power and latency-demanding applications. To enable event cameras to operate alongside staple sensors like lidar in perception tasks, we propose a direct, temporally-decoupled extrinsic calibration method between event cameras and lidars. The high dynamic range, high temporal resolution, and low-latency operation of event cameras are exploited to directly register lidar laser returns, allowing information-based correlation methods to optimize for the 6-DoF extrinsic calibration between the two sensors. This paper presents the first direct calibration method between event cameras and lidars, removing dependencies on frame-based camera intermediaries and/or highly-accurate hand measurements.