Paper ID: 2410.23522

LBurst: Learning-Based Robotic Burst Feature Extraction for 3D Reconstruction in Low Light

Ahalya Ravendran, Mitch Bryson, Donald G. Dansereau

Drones have revolutionized the fields of aerial imaging, mapping, and disaster recovery. However, the deployment of drones in low-light conditions is constrained by the image quality produced by their on-board cameras. In this paper, we present a learning architecture for improving 3D reconstructions in low-light conditions by finding features in a burst. Our approach enhances visual reconstruction by detecting and describing high quality true features and less spurious features in low signal-to-noise ratio images. We demonstrate that our method is capable of handling challenging scenes in millilux illumination, making it a significant step towards drones operating at night and in extremely low-light applications such as underground mining and search and rescue operations.

Submitted: Oct 31, 2024