Abstract
A new tool for image understanding is stated in this paper: the visual hull of an object. Many algorithms for identifying or reconstructing 3-D objects use the 2-D silhouette of the object. If a non-convex object S is considered, some features of the surface of S can be useless for identification based on silhouettes; the same features of S cannot be reconstructed by volume intersection algorithms using a set of silhouettes extracted from multiple views of the object. Broadly speaking, we define the visual hull of an object or set of objects S as the envelope of all the possible visual rays tangent to S. Only the features of the surface of S which lies also on the surface of the visual hull can be reconstructed or identified using silhouette-based algorithms. After a suitable general discussion, this paper presents an algorithm for computing the visual hull in 2-D. A precise statement of the visual hull concept appears to be new, as well as the problem of its computation.
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© 1992 Springer Science+Business Media New York
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Laurentini, A. (1992). The Visual Hull and Its Computation in 2-D. In: Arcelli, C., Cordella, L.P., di Baja, G.S. (eds) Visual Form. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4899-0715-8_35
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4899-0715-8_35
Publisher Name: Springer, Boston, MA
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