Patent ID: 7162338

Claim:
A method of computing a relative pose for autonomous localization for a mobile device, the method comprising: identifying one visual landmark of a plurality of stored visual landmarks that matches an image provided by a visual sensor coupled to the mobile device; identifying corresponding features shown in both the image and the matching visual landmark; determining 2-dimensional coordinates within the image for the corresponding features of the image; retrieving 3-dimensional data consisting essentially of 3-dimensional coordinates of a plurality of the corresponding features of the matching visual landmark; computing a hypothetical device pose by: projecting the 3-dimensional coordinates of the corresponding features of the matching visual landmark onto new 2-dimensional coordinates of a hypothetical image, where the hypothetical image corresponds to an image that would be observed by the visual sensor if the device were to be re-posed according to the hypothetical device pose; generating a projection error by comparing the new 2-dimensional coordinates to the 2-dimensional coordinates for the corresponding features of the image; and solving for the hypothetical device pose that corresponds to a low projection error; and using the hypothetical device pose as the computed relative device pose.