Application of panospheric imaging to a teleoperated lunar rover

Abstract

Both vehicle teleoperation effectiveness and on-looker interest is enhanced through the availability of omnidirectional images. For the application of a lunar rover, panospheric imaging has advantages over traditional methods for acquiring a panoramic view. By eliminating moving parts, panospheric imaging and radial camera arrays are more reliable than pan/tilt or panoramic cameras. The wide field of view captured by panospheric optics results in halving the number of cameras which must be flown on the rover, which in turn reduces power and mass budgets, cabling complexity and thermal management issues. In addition, panospheric images distribute more resolution to the horizon and less to the near ground than radial camera arrays, which is more appropriate for an edutainment-based mission. Future work will investigate issues of immersive visualization and display methods, design of optics and algorithms suited for the lunar environment, and terrain reconstruction.