A general overview of notable developments in automated close-range photogrammetry (CRP) over the past three decades is presented. Advances in CRP have paralleled, invariably independently, developments in computer vision, though the two disciplines have become more intertwined over the past 15 years, while maintaing their own distinctive goals. With automation in photogrammetric orientation and triangulation, and innovations centred upon so-called structure-from-motion approaches and dense image matching, CRP has over recent years attracted a broader user community who are applying the technology across a host of new application areas. Following a short historical review and some comments upon distinctions and complementarities between CRP and computer vision, three main orientation and 3D point determination data processing options are discussed, along with the need to consider processing pipelines that integrate these three principal workflows. Practical examples highlight that while targetless multi-image orientation and dense matching have provided significant impetus to CRP, such full automation in photogrammetric data processing does not necessarily provide a panacea for all image-based 3D measurement ills.
Clive Fraser is currently a Professorial Fellow in the Department of Infrastructure Engineering at the University of Melbourne, as well as being a Science Adviser at FrontierSI (formerly the Cooperative Research Centre for Spatial Information) and Technical Director of the Photometrix Division of Geodetic Systems, Inc. Prof. Fraser’s particular areas of research interest lie in digital close-range photogrammetry, including 3D forensic analysis and industrial measurement systems, and the metric exploitation of both drone and high-resolution satellite imagery. He is a Fellow of both the Australian Academy of Technology and Engineering, and the American Society of Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing, and he is an Honorary Member of The Remote Sensing and Photogrammetric Society (UK). In recognition of his academic and professional work, which include authorship of more than 380 scientific publications, he has earned numerous international awards.
