Rotation estimation from noisy sonar images and distortion corrections for nonlinearities

In the previous conference a new vehicle attitude estimation method was proposed using imaging sonars with Hough transformation for noisy sonar images. The method estimates onboard sonar attitude parameters from the location of the reference plane in the sonar image. In this paper a new rotation parameter estimation is introduced using these attitude parameter time variations. It does not require the Hough transformation, hence it is useful for smaller and lighter ocean observing platforms. After summarizing the attitude estimation based on the Hough transformation, the new procedure is explained referring its coordinate system which is one of the most significant features of the method. Moreover three distortions found in the attitude estimation are discussed and suppression procedures are presented.