College of Engineering Unit:
Our tool serves as a way to merge multiple Low-Dynamic Range (LDR) images into a single High-Dynamic Range (HDR) image. HDR images carry more data per pixel than LDR images, making them useful for visualizing certain aspects of the image.
In a setting where a user wants to take LDR photos to later be merged into an HDR photo, users will take multiple photos from a stationary camera utilizing a fisheye lens, in which the exposure is gradually increased. The specific camera attributes such as resolution, lens diameter, and viewing angles will be known by the camera operator at the time the photos are taken. The user will also have calibration (.cal) files on hand that are tailored to the camera’s settings specifically, which undo the warping caused by the fisheye lens of the camera.
Having the prepared information (LDR images, camera settings, necessary .cal files), the user can input all of them into our tool at once, click a “Go” button which starts an automatic pipeline of commands, and finally receive a generated HDR image that has been calibrated.
Our app serves as both a form for input files and a way to execute certain commands automatically. The computations for calibrating the images themselves are run on existing software called Radiance and HDRgen. The external software runs in the command line interface, which can be difficult for many to use– this is why we have created a graphical user interface (GUI): we want users of a wide range of technical ability to be able to use our free software to create these HDR images for use in their research. We have designed our application to be easy to pick up and learn by conducting many prototype evaluations with volunteers of varying skill levels and familiarity in this field, and have tweaked our design based on their feedback regarding clarity, ease of use, and readability.
Project Website(s):
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 Expo Poster | 840.16 KB |