Active gaze control for attentional visual SLAM

Abstract

In this paper, we introduce an approach to active camera control for visual SLAM. Features, detected by a biologically motivated attention system, are tracked over several frames to determine stable landmarks. Matching of features to database entries enables global loop closing. The focus of this paper is the active camera control module, which supports the system with three behaviours: (i) A tracking behaviour tracks promising landmarks and prevents them from leaving the field of view, (ii) A redetection behaviour directs the camera actively to regions where landmarks are expected and thus supports loop closing, (iii) Finally, an exploration behaviour investigates regions without landmarks and enables a more uniform distribution of landmarks. Several real-world experiments show that the active camera control outperforms the passive system considerably.