LiDAR data augmentation by interpolation on spherical range image

LiDAR sensors are used for mapping tasks, LiDAR odometry or 3D environment reconstruction. Several of them count with a high number of vertical layers, which increase their price and prevents research groups from carrying out experiments and scientific advances. In this paper, we propose a method for augmenting point cloud data by bilinear interpolation in a Spherical Range Image. Our method improves others on the state-of-the-art by means of standard deviation filtering of the newly generated layers. The system operates at a frequency greater than 10 Hz for data interpolation up to 20 times. In addition, we present two applications for our approach such as LiDAR odometry and LiDAR-Camera fusion, obtaining better results than others that do not apply data augmentation. Finally we make available to the scientific community a package development on ROS (Robot Operating System). The code is available at https://github.com/EPVelasco/lidar-camera-fusion

Keywords: LiDAR, sensor fusion, LiDAR odometry, bilinear interpolation.

Recommended citation: Edison Velasco-Sánchez, Ignacio de Loyola Páez-Ubieta, Francisco A. Candelas, Santiago T. Puente (2023). "LiDAR data augmentation by interpolation on spherical range image." 2023 IEEE 28th International Conference on Emerging Technologies and Factory Automation (ETFA). 1-4, doi: 10.1109/ETFA54631.2023.10275512
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