METHODS AND ARRANGEMENTS FOR OBJECT POSE ESTIMATION
In an illustrative embodiment, the free space attenuation of illumination with distance, according to a square law relationship, is used to estimate the distance between a light source and two or more different areas on the surface of a product package. By reference to these distance estimates, the angular pose of the object surface is determined.
1 . A method comprising:
illuminating an object at a supermarket checkout station;
capturing image data from the illuminated object;
identifying two spaced-apart regions on the object; and
by reference to excerpts of the captured image data corresponding to said two spaced-apart regions, determining pose information for the object.
2 . The method of claim 1 in which the illuminating comprises illuminating the object with infrared illumination.
3 . The method of claim 1 in which the identifying comprises identifying two spaced-apart regions on the object that are free of black ink printing.
4 . The method of claim 3 in which the identifying comprises applying a busyness metric to identify two spaced-apart regions that are free of black ink printing.
5 . A supermarket scanning system including an infrared illumination source, a processor and a memory, the memory containing programming instructions that configure the system to perform acts including:
illuminating an object with infrared illumination;
capturing image data from the illuminated object;
by reference to the captured image data, identifying two spaced-apart regions on the object that are free of black ink printing; and
by reference to excerpts of the captured image data corresponding to said two spaced-apart regions, determining pose information for the object.
6 . A computer readable medium containing programming instructions that configure a supermarket scanning system that includes an infrared illumination source to perform acts including:
illuminating an object with infrared illumination;
capturing image data from the illuminated object;
by reference to the captured image data, identifying two spaced-apart regions on the object that are free of black ink printing; and
by reference to excerpts of the captured image data corresponding to said two spaced-apart regions, determining pose information for the object.