Patent ID: 7274470

Claim:
An optical 3D digitizer with an enlarged non-ambiguity zone, comprising: at least one structured light projector for projecting a fringe pattern over a target area, the fringe pattern having a shiftable position over the target area; a first camera directed toward the target area and positioned with respect to said at least one structured light projector to define a first triangulation plane therewith; a second camera directed toward the target area and positioned with respect to said at least one structured light projector to define a second triangulation plane therewith, the second triangulation plane being distinct from the first triangulation plane, the first and second cameras having at least partially overlapping measurement fields, the second camera having a larger non-ambiguity depth than the first camera; and a computer means connected to the cameras, for performing an image processing of images captured by the cameras, the image processing including evaluating a same set of camera-projector related functions from images including the pattern projected by said at least one structured light projector at shifted positions as captured by the cameras, building a low depth resolution 3D model from the camera-projector related functions evaluated with respect to the second camera, building a degenerated 3D model from the camera-projector related functions evaluated with respect to the first camera, determining chromatic texture from the images captured by the cameras, and building a complete textured 3D model from data corresponding between the low depth resolution and degenerated 3D models within a tolerance range.