Cylinder object 6-DOF pose estimation via single perspective circle on cylindrical surface

Abstract Pose estimation is an important research topic in computer vision. In this paper, a novel method for six-degree-of-freedom (6–DOF) pose estimation of cylindrical objects via a single perspective circle on cylindrical surface is proposed. Unlike traditional methods that rely on planar circular features, a circular feature target which is affixed to the side of cylindrical objects is utilized. The geometric properties of the spatial curve formed by its contour are leveraged for pose estimation. Specifically, the imaging model of the spatial curve is established to derive the general equation of its projection curve. The initial pose is determined based on the perspective principle, and the final optimized pose is obtained with the least squares method. To avoid local optima, a verification and correction method is proposed to enhance estimation accuracy. Synthetic and physical experiments demonstrate that the proposed method can achieve real-time, high-precision pose estimation for cylindrical objects, exhibiting robustness against occlusion and noise interference.