locating key views for image indexing of spaces
Image is a dominant medium for visualizing spatial environment and creating virtual access on the Internet. Where to capture images is however subjective and relies on artistic sense of photographers so far. In this paper, we will not only visualize areas with images, but also determine where the most distinct viewpoints should be located. Starting from elevation data of an area, we present spatial and content information in ground based images such that (1) a given number of images can have maximum coverage on informative scenes; (2) a sequence of views can be concatenated with minimum continuity along most-exposed-paths. According to scene visibility, continuity, and data redundancy we evaluate viewpoints numerically with an object-emitting illumination model. Our view exploration may eventually reduce data to archive and transmit, facilitate image acquisition, indexing and interaction, and enhance human perception of spaces. Real images are captured based on our planned key positions to form a visual network to index the area.
key view image indexing visibility spatial visualization virtual environments camera placement panorama