TOWARDS AN OPERATIONAL STEREO SYSTEM FOR DIRECTIONAL WAVE MEASUREMENTS FROM MOVING PLATFORMS

Stereo video imaging of water surface has become an effective instrumentation to gather wind waves 3-D data from small to medium range spatial scales. Indeed, recent applications of stereo techniques provided new insights of space-time distributions of sea wave elevations, small scale wave statistics, and directional wave spectra. Like most photogrammetric applications, an accurate calibration of the optical acquisition machinery is required to provide a low-noise, precise and reliable surface reconstruction adequate to extract meaningful wavy surfaces. However, for practical open field applications, there is a strong interest to provide a calibration procedure apt to be performed in an uncomfortable environment in which it may be unfeasible to take apart or even physically access the device.