On-the-fly acquisition and rendering with low cost LiDAR and RGB cameras for marine navigation

This paper describes a hardware/software system, dubbed NausicaaVR, for acquiring and rendering 3D environments in the context of marine navigation. Like other similar work, it focuses on system calibration and rendering but the specific context poses new and more difficult challenges for the development when compared to the classic automotive scenario. We provide a comprehensive description of all the components of the system, explicitly reporting on encountered problems and subtle choices to overcome those, in an attempt to render an insightful picture of how this and similar systems are built.