The 3D reconstruction of straight and curved pipes using digital line photogrammetry

From the industry a growing demand for as-built digital information of large pipe systems exists. In this paper two models are presented which enable the reconstruction of straight and curved pipes from digital images. The model for straight pipes is based on Mulawa's coplanarity constraint defining a relation between the unknown parameters of a 3D Line and measured points on this line in a set of images. Furthermore a model is developed for the reconstruction of curved pipes. The combination of both models will result in a fast and more accurate determination of the parameters of both the straight and curved pipes. It is shown that line photogrammetry can be an appropriate method for the reconstruction of straight pipes. Tests on a set of images of a pipe frame gives encouraging results for the use of digital Line photogrammetry for the 3D reconstruction of pipe systems. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.