Quality Assessment of Stereophotoclinometry as a Shape Modeling Method Using a Synthetic Asteroid

Abstract The stereophotoclinometry (SPC) software suite has been used to generate global digital terrain models (DTMs) of many asteroids and moons, and was the primary tool used by the Origins, Spectral Interpretation, Resource Identification, and Security-Regolith Explorer (OSIRIS-REx) mission to model the shape of asteroid Bennu. We describe the dedicated preflight testing of SPC for the OSIRIS-REx mission using a synthetic “truth” asteroid model. SPC has metrics that determine the internal consistency of a DTM, but it was not known how these metrics are related to the absolute accuracy of a DTM, which was important for the operational needs of the mission. The absolute accuracy of an SPC-generated DTM cannot be determined without knowing the truth topography. Consequently, we developed a realistic, but synthetic, computer-generated representation of asteroid Bennu, photographed this synthetic truth model in an imaging campaign similar to that planned for the OSIRIS-REx mission, and then generated a global SPC DTM from these images. We compared the SPC DTM, which was represented by a radius every 70 cm across the asteroid surface, to the synthetic truth model to assess the absolute accuracy. We found that the internal consistency can be used to determine the 3D root-mean-square accuracy of the model to within a factor of two of the absolute accuracy.