Localization of objects from range data

A technique is presented for determining the orientation of an object from single-view range data. The objects and models are represented by regions that are a collection of surface patches homogeneous in curvature-based properties. Given exactly one point on the surface of the unknown view of an object and the corresponding point on the surface of the model of the object, the principal vectors (if unique) can be used to determine the 3-D rotation required to bring the model into the same orientation as that of the object. To determine this one-point correspondence, curves of constant principal curvature are extracted from the surfaces (corresponding to regions possessing the same sign of the principal curvatures) of the model and the unknown view of an object. Then, the local maxima in the curvature of these curves are utilized as a means to establish the one-point correspondence