Overlap elimination for registered range images

Three-dimensional (3D) data processing and modeling from range images plays an important role in many applications. Since overlap elimination of registered range images is a necessary step in 3D object modeling, many research efforts have been made. In this paper, a novel approach for eliminating overlaps of a registered data set is proposed. Firstly, the input data (registered range images) which contain overlaps is represented by a bd-tree data structure. Then, moving least squares (MLS) and spin map (SM) together with the nearest neighbor searching are used to identify and eliminate the overlaps. The method manipulates the registered images directly without meshing them first, therefore, provides a straightforward way to remove redundant data, which makes it different from the conventional methods. The experimental results demonstrate the efficiency of the proposed algorithm.