In this research, we present a depth prediction model designed for a range of applications, moving beyond the traditional scope of assisted and autonomous driving systems. Our model emphasizes absolute accuracy over relative accuracy, tackling the challenge of performance deterioration at extended ranges.
To bolster our novel design, we employed the AirSim Unreal Engine simulator to develop a tailored dataset, capturing various scene locations. This approach aids in mitigating model overfitting to nuances such as textures and colors. With over 2.7 million images from diverse scene locations under different environmental conditions, our dataset provided a rich variety of perspectives and distances for training. We further enriched the dataset with images from 14 RGB and depth sensor pairs, strategically placed at varied pitch and yaw angles on a drone, enhancing the model’s adaptability. Notably, our reliance on simulation data aligns our model closely with real-world scenarios.
At the core of our model are features like the overlap patch embedding block, an optimized self-attention mechanism, and a Mixed-Feed Forward Network. Together, they facilitate improved depth prediction, even at considerable distances. Empirical evaluations show consistent performance across a broad depth range, with a Mean Absolute Percent Error (MAPE) of 5-10% maintained up to 1900 meters. However, performance decreases beyond this range, signaling opportunities for future enhancements.
Regarding real-world results, due to the lack of available supervision, real data was analyzed qualitatively. Preliminary observations suggest that the outcomes appear reasonable and align well with expectations, although quantitative validations remain a direction for future research.
Our research provides statistical evidence and visual illustrations of our model’s capabilities in depth prediction. The combination of our approach and insights from the simulation data suggests potential for further advancements in the field of depth prediction.
A bathymetric LiDAR system’s emitted laser pulse is affected by many system specific and environmental variables, including sea water scattering and absorption, seafloor reflectance and rugosity, in-air attenuation, electronic bandwidth and noise, among others. These factors influence the captured, digitized waveform which can be used to estimate seafloor depth and sea water properties. Understanding how these parameters influence bathymetric LiDAR waveforms and extracting estimates of these parameters is important in developing more accurate analysis techniques as well as creating data products that are associated with georectified coordinates. However, estimating more than ten parameters from a collection of waveforms that may or may not have correlated parameters is challenging. This paper details a post-processing technique used to estimate bathymetric environmental parameters through robust simulation of airborne LiDAR data that models laser beam propagation in a specific bathymetric environment. To create an initial waveform, the simulator is seeded with known parameters and with reasonable estimates for unknown parameters. Then, using optimization algorithms, the unknown parameters are iteratively adjusted, creating a waveform that minimizes error between it and an associated truth waveform. By estimating these unknown values for many waveforms within a geographic area, the distributions of the environmental factors can be characterized for future analysis.
In recent years, the field of automated machine learning (autoML) has quickly attracted significant attention both in academia and industry. The driving force is to reduce the amount of human intervention required to process data and create models for classification and prediction, a tedious and arbitrary process for data scientists that may not often result in achieving a global optimum with respect to multiple objectives. Moreover, existing autoML techniques rely on extremely large collections of relatively clean training data, which is not typical of Multi-Domain Battle (MDB) applications. In this paper, we describe a methodology to optimize underwater seafloor detection for airborne bathymetric lidar, an application domain with sparse truth data, leveraging evolutionary algorithms and genetic programming. Our methodology uses the Evolutionary Multi-objective Algorithm Design Engine (EMADE) and a radiometric waveform simulator generating millions of waveforms from which genetic programming techniques select optimal signal processing techniques and their parameters given the goal of reducing Total Propagated Uncertainty (TPU). The EMADE affords several benefits not found in other autoML solutions, including the ability to stack machine learning models, process time-series data using dozens of signal-processing techniques, and efficiently evaluate algorithms on multiple objectives. Given the lack of truth data, we tune EMADE to produce detection algorithms that improve accuracy and reduce relevant measurement uncertainties for a wide variety of operational and environmental scenarios. Preliminary testing indicates successfully reducing TPU and reducing over- and under-prediction errors by 13.8% and 68.2% respectively, foreshadowing using EMADE to assist in future MDB-application algorithm development.
We are interested in data fusion strategies for Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance (ISR) missions. Advances
in theory, algorithms, and computational power have made it possible to extract rich semantic information from a wide
variety of sensors, but these advances have raised new challenges in fusing the data. For example, in developing fusion
algorithms for moving target identification (MTI) applications, what is the best way to combine image data having
different temporal frequencies, and how should we introduce contextual information acquired from monitoring cell
phones or from human intelligence? In addressing these questions we have found that existing data fusion models do not
readily facilitate comparison of fusion algorithms performing such complex information extraction, so we developed a
new model that does. Here, we present the Spatial, Temporal, Algorithm, and Cognition (STAC) model. STAC allows
for describing the progression of multi-sensor raw data through increasing levels of abstraction, and provides a way to
easily compare fusion strategies. It provides for unambiguous description of how multi-sensor data are combined, the
computational algorithms being used, and how scene understanding is ultimately achieved. In this paper, we describe
and illustrate the STAC model, and compare it to other existing models.
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