The abstract

The 3D method of computer modeling has been developed and introduced in my Ph.D. thesis and in a project associated with research. The method presented gives estimates of the full vector of parameters for any moving object. The widespread investigation was concerned with time performance, attainable accuracy and the tolerance of the method to motion-blurred input images. Following this line of attack we can evaluate the angles of pitch, yaw and roll on take-off and landing by the TV tracking systems in real time operation and with a high accuracy. The real-time computation is defined with TV frame period (40 millisecond). Measurement error for the pitch, yaw and roll angles is less then 1 degree at the distance to 400 meters. An error in measuring the coordinate of center on the distance does not exceed 0,5 meters in range to 600 meters (in the absence of input noise and noise filtering). This method enables us to solve several problems of practical importance in a number of areas such as 3D computer graphics, measurements of moving objects spatial location by television methods, flight test in real time, flight safety, flight control systems, preset guidance, tracking, nonmaterial research, quick look data, telemetering, data acquisition, attitude control systems and controllability, command guidance systems, directional stability, remote control, systems simulation, vehicle acquisition, discrimination and identification, digital image processing and recognition, computer vision. The results of this investigation are used for measurements of moving objects spatial location by television methods and for security of moving objects in the project of Flight Research Institute of the name M.M. Gromov (Zhukovsky, Moscow region, Russia) and Department of Television and Transmitters (Saint - Petersburg State University of Aerospace Instrumentation, Saint – Petersburg, Russia).

The key words

3D computer graphics, digital image processing and recognition, measurements of moving objects spatial location by television methods, flight test, flight safety, flight control systems, preset guidance, tracking, telemetering, data acquisition, attitude control systems and controllability, command guidance systems, directional stability, remote control, systems simulation, vehicle acquisition, discrimination and identification, computer vision.

The introduction

The creation of modern flight vehicles (aircraft) is very costly. Optimum organization of flight tests will reduce technical and economic risk. The most critical stage while conducting flight tests is take-off and landing. Investigation of aviation incidents showed: 60 % aviation incidents occur during take-off and landing and 30 % of aviation incidents occur with the gain and decrease of altitude.

During the take-off and landing, the flight vehicle is located in the near-field radar-tracking zone. A moving object cannot be considered as a point target and the measurement of trajectory is difficult. The use of usual radar equipment will not give effective results. Radar images contain fewer image elements in comparison with television images. The accuracy of TV systems in this case is higher. Image processing is executed on the computer.

Previous investigations in this direction were carried out at the Flight Research Institute named by M.M. Gromov (Zhukovsky, Moscow region, Russia), Department of Television and Transmitters, Saint - Petersburg State University of Aerospace Instrumentation (Timofeev B.S., Krasilnikov N.N., Filatov V.N., Astratov O.S., Gulevitsky A.Y.) and Scientific Research Institute of a Television (Saint - Petersburg). The outcome was the determination of the coordinates of conditional centre and the distance to an object. The use of this method allows one to measure angles of orientation in space, i.e. full vector of parameters of movement of a flight vehicle.