A new laser rangefinder for measuring 3D shapes of specular objects in a real environment

A laser rangefinder based on a triangulation method is widely used because of several advantaged. However in order to measure the 3D shapes of specular objects, it is desirable that the position sensor in the rangefinder has the capability of detecting incid ent position and angle simultaneously. Moreover, it is important for the sensor to be robust against light noise present in the environment in which the measurements take place. Here, we describe a new laser rangefinder that accurately determines the 3D shapes of specular objects with certain types of background light through the use of a neural network.