Stereo vision based road surface preview

Road surface preview is an application where road surface elevation profile in front of the host vehicle is estimated, whereby bumps and potholes can be detected for active suspension control and roadway maintenance. In this paper, we describe a stereo vision system that performs road surface preview along the host vehicle path. Real-time 3D road surface reconstruction was calculated from stereo range images at centimeter scale to provide elevation profiles along predicted tire tracks. Camera pitch angle is dynamically estimated, which is used to correct elevation errors caused by host vehicle pitching up and down on the roadway. Having been implemented in embedded hardware and tested in passenger vehicles, the described system showed good performance for various road conditions and on different road surfaces (asphalt, concrete, and dirt roads).