Towards precise real-time 3D difference detection for industrial applications

3D difference detection is the task to verify whether the 3D geometry of a real object exactly corresponds to a 3D model of this object. We present an approach for 3D difference detection with a hand-held depth camera. In contrast to previous approaches, with the presented approach geometric differences can be detected in real-time and from arbitrary viewpoints. The 3D difference detection accuracy is improved by two approaches: first, the precision of the depth camera's pose estimation is improved by coupling the depth camera with a high precision industrial measurement arm. Second, the influence of the depth measurement noise is reduced by integrating a 3D surface reconstruction algorithm. The effects of both enhancements are quantified by a ground-truth based quantitative evaluation, both for a time-of-flight (SwissRanger 4000) and a structured light depth camera (Kinect). With the proposed enhancements, differences of few millimeters can be detected from 1 m measurement distance.