Dear PhotoScan team,
small objects are often measured with a stationary camera, while moving the object on a turntable or a 2-axis gimbal. With a stepper motor under computer control, this motion can be highly reproducible, which offers the possibility to locate the "camera positions" (with respect to the object) with optimum accuracy using a large and cooperative calibration target, and to re-import the information into PhotoScan.
To my knowledge, this is now only possible for the positions X, Y, Z, but not for the camera orientations Roll, Pitch and Yaw. With the complete externals from a calibration, and assuming this data to be exact, one should be able to skip the whole alignment step, offering these advantages:
- saving of time
- better results for objects seen under a small angle (smaller than the calibration target) from the camera
- setting a calibrated reference coordinate system if the target includes a known distance.
Best regards,
Twister