A sensor-based SLAM algorithm for camera tracking in virtual studio

This paper addresses a sensor-based simultaneous localization and mapping (SLAM) algorithm for camera tracking in a virtual studio environment. The traditional camera tracking methods in virtual studios are vision-based or sensor-based. However, the chroma keying process in virtual studios requires color cues, such as blue background, to segment foreground objects to be inserted into images and videos. Chroma keying limits the application of vision-based tracking methods in virtual studios since the background cannot provide enough feature information. Furthermore, the conventional sensor-based tracking approaches suffer from the jitter, drift or expensive computation due to the characteristics of individual sensor system. Therefore, the SLAM techniques from the mobile robot area are first investigated and adapted to the camera tracking area. Then, a sensor-based SLAM extension algorithm for two dimensional (2D) camera tracking in virtual studio is described. Also, a technique called map adjustment is proposed to increase the accuracy and efficiency of the algorithm. The feasibility and robustness of the algorithm is shown by experiments. The simulation results demonstrate that the sensor-based SLAM algorithm can satisfy the fundamental 2D camera tracking requirement in virtual studio environment.