Abstract
Laser scanning is an effective tool for acquiring geometric attributes of trees and vegetation, which lays a solid foundation for 3-dimensional tree modelling. Existing studies on tree modelling from laser scanning data are vast. However, some works cannot guarantee sufficient modelling accuracy, while some other works are mainly rule-based and therefore highly depend on user inputs. In this paper, we propose a novel method to accurately and automatically reconstruct detailed 3D tree models from laser scans. We first extract an initial tree skeleton from the input point cloud by establishing a minimum spanning tree using the Dijkstra shortest-path algorithm. Then, the initial tree skeleton is pruned by iteratively removing redundant components. After that, an optimization-based approach is performed to fit a sequence of cylinders to approximate the geometry of the tree branches. Experiments on various types of trees from different data sources demonstrate the effectiveness and robustness of our method. The overall fitting error (i.e., the distance between the input points and the output model) is less than 10 cm. The reconstructed tree models can be further applied in the precise estimation of tree attributes, urban landscape visualization, etc. The source code of this work is freely available at https://github.com/tudelft3d/adtree.
Highlights
Trees are an important component throughout the world
Based on the fact that points close to each other are likely to belong to the same branch, we construct an Minimum Spanning Tree (MST) graph over the input point cloud to represent the initial tree skeleton
We compute the distance between input points and the output tree branch model to verify the geometrical accuracy of the modelling results
Summary
Trees are an important component throughout the world. They form and function in natural ecosystems such as forests, and in human-made environments for instance parks and gardens [1]. Models of trees have a wide range of applications, including urban landscape design, ecological simulation, forestry management, and virtual entertainment. While applications such as landscape design and visualization only require modelling virtual trees, lots of other applications relevant for ecological modelling and forestry management require accurate estimation of tree parameters (e.g., height, stem thickness). Accurate tree modelling enhances the realism of a scene, and provides promising approaches to scientifically manage vegetation and forests, which will in return contribute to ecosystem protection, resource preservation, preventing degradation, and many other human activities [3]. Obtaining accurate 3D tree models is necessary and of great importance to the modern society
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