Towards Reconstruction of 3D Geometry of Underwater Rubble Mounds via Structure from Motion

Reconstruction of underwater 3D geometry is indispensable in many marine science fields. Compared with traditionally employed devices like acoustic equipment for reconstructing 3D underwater scenes, Structure from Motion (SfM) advantageously give detailed, colored underwater 3D structures. Although reconstruction of 3D geometry via SfM is successfully performed in clear underwater conditions, is yet challenging in turbid environments, because of severe underwater image degradation which makes feature matching difficult necessary for SfM. Towards reconstruction of underwater 3D geometry via SfM, we first evaluate the degree of feature matching among enhanced underwater images. Second, we reconstruct 3D geometry of underwater rubble mounds in port construction. We show that color correction and image sharpening improve results of feature matching and reconstruction of 3D geometry.