Indoor localization for augmented reality devices using BIM, point clouds, and template matching

  • Mobile devices are a common target for augmented reality applications, especially for showing contextual information in buildings or construction sites. A prerequisite of contextual information display is the localization of objects and the device in the real world. In this paper, we present our approach to the problem of mobile indoor localization with a given building model. The approach does not use external sensors or input. Accurate external sensors such as stationary cameras may be expensive and difficult to set up and maintain. Relying on already existing external sources may also prove to be difficult, as especially inside buildings, Internet connections can be unreliable and GPS signals can be inaccurate. Therefore, we try to find a localization solution for augmented reality devices that can accurately localize itself only with data from internal sensors and preexisting information about the building. If a building has an accurate model of its geometry, we can use modern spatial mapping techniques and point-cloud matching to find a mapping between local device coordinates and global model coordinates. We use normal analysis and 2D template matching on an inverse distance map to determine this mapping. The proposed algorithm is designed to have a high speed and efficiency, as mobile devices are constrained by hardware limitations. We show an implementation of the algorithm on the Microsoft HoloLens, test the localization accuracy, and offer use cases for the technology.

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Metadaten
Author:Patrick HerbersORCiDGND, Markus KönigORCiDGND
URN:urn:nbn:de:hbz:294-78319
DOI:https://doi.org/10.3390/app9204260
Parent Title (English):Applied sciences
Publisher:MDPI
Place of publication:Basel
Document Type:Article
Language:English
Date of Publication (online):2021/02/04
Date of first Publication:2019/10/11
Publishing Institution:Ruhr-Universität Bochum, Universitätsbibliothek
Tag:Augmented reality; BIM; indoor localization; indoor navigation; localization; point cloud; pose estimation
Volume:9
Issue:20, Article 4260
First Page:4260-1
Last Page:4260-15
Institutes/Facilities:Lehrstuhl für Informatik im Bauwesen
Dewey Decimal Classification:Technik, Medizin, angewandte Wissenschaften / Ingenieurbau, Umwelttechnik
open_access (DINI-Set):open_access
Licence (English):License LogoCreative Commons - CC BY 4.0 - Attribution 4.0 International