US 6,982,712 B2
Three-dimensional model generating system and method, and computer program therefor
Yasunori Ohto, Tokyo (Japan)
Assigned to Sony Corporation, Tokyo (Japan)
Filed on Mar. 21, 2003, as Appl. No. 10/392,864.
Claims priority of application No. 2002-089967 (JP), filed on Mar. 27, 2002.
Prior Publication US 2003/0184545 A1, Oct. 02, 2003
Int. Cl. G06T 17/00 (2006.01); G06T 15/00 (2006.01); G01V 3/38 (2006.01)
U.S. Cl. 345—420 6 Claims
OG exemplary drawing
 
1. A three-dimensional model generating system for generating a building model on the basis of map information describing the arrangement of building regions and roads on a two-dimensional plane and elevation-data that is generated by mapping altitude information to each observation point on the two-dimensional plane, comprising:
a coordinate transform obtaining unit that performs coordinate transformation from the map information to the elevation-data;
a building region extracting unit that arranges the altitude information according to each building region;
a plane extraction unit that extracts planes including the altitude information on the basis of the altitude information according to each building region;
a boundary line identifying unit that identifies a boundary between the planes; and
a plane connection unit that connects the planes, between which the boundary has been identified, whereby the building model formed of a simply-connected polyhedron is generated,
wherein the plane extraction unit extracts, as vertices constructing a plane in a building location boundary, observation points whose altitude information are contained by the same plane within an acceptable error range and generates the plane including the extracted vertices;
the plane extraction unit extracts, as boundary vertices of the boundary between the planes in the building location boundary, observation points whose altitude information are not contained by the same plane within the acceptable error range, and determines the boundary between the planes in the building location boundary on the basis of the extracted boundary vertices; and
when the boundary between the planes, the boundary being determined on the basis of the boundary vertices extracted in the building location boundary, does not connect to the building location boundary, the boundary line identifying unit adds an auxiliary line so that the boundary between the planes connects to the building location boundary.