Towards Versatile Opti-Acoustic Sensor Fusion and Volumetric Mapping

TL;DR

This paper introduces a novel volumetric mapping framework that fuses stereo sonar and monocular camera data, enabling autonomous underwater vehicles to navigate safely in diverse visibility conditions by producing reliable 3D maps.

Contribution

The framework uniquely combines sonar and camera data with confidence-weighted Gaussian Process mapping, improving 3D mapping robustness in turbid and clear environments.

Findings

Effective in turbid and clear water conditions

Produces detailed 3D point clouds with confidence metrics

Outperforms existing opti-acoustic and sonar mapping methods

Abstract

Accurate 3D volumetric mapping is critical for autonomous underwater vehicles operating in obstacle-rich environments. Vision-based perception provides high-resolution data but fails in turbid conditions, while sonar is robust to lighting and turbidity but suffers from low resolution and elevation ambiguity. This paper presents a volumetric mapping framework that fuses a stereo sonar pair with a monocular camera to enable safe navigation under varying visibility conditions. Overlapping sonar fields of view resolve elevation ambiguity, producing fully defined 3D point clouds at each time step. The framework identifies regions of interest in camera images, associates them with corresponding sonar returns, and combines sonar range with camera-derived elevation cues to generate additional 3D points. Each 3D point is assigned a confidence value reflecting its reliability. These confidence-weighted points are fused using a Gaussian Process Volumetric Mapping framework that prioritizes the most reliable measurements. Experimental comparisons with other opti-acoustic and sonar-based approaches, along with field tests in a marina environment, demonstrate the method's effectiveness in capturing complex geometries and preserving critical information for robot navigation in both clear and turbid conditions. Our code is open-source to support community adoption.