🚀 go-pugleaf

I thought I would ask this, Does anyone know if much progress/work/theorising
has been done on 3D depth mapping?

What I am trying to get a phrase for is some sort of system that you point
at something and it returns a 2d map of z-values corresponding to the distance
from the sensor of the first thing it hits. (sort of like a 2d version of
those fish sensor things they use in fishing), y'know, they point it downwards
beneath the boat and get something like:

.                   x
 .            x    
  .. .                    .
    . ..........  .....  ...... .          <- sea bed
                            .

where: x - is possible fish schools.

Anyway, what I need is some system for determining the distance to objects
within about a 100 degree cone (or sq. base pyramid) eminating from the
sensor location:

                X     <- sensor
               / \
              /   \
             /     \
            /       \     <- sensor range and area
           /  .......  \
          /..        ..\
          ..          ..
            ...........

Hopefully returning a 2d grid with the distance information and some special
number (or really large) for out-of-range values. so if you point
it down at a table with a block on it you may get something like:

 11 10 10 10  9 10 10 10 10 11
 11 10 10 10  9   6 10 10 10 11
 11 10 10   6  5   6   6 10 10 11
 11 10   6   6  5   6   6 10 10 11
 11 10 10   6  5   6   6   6 10 11
 11 10 10   6  5   6   6 10 10 11
 11 10 10 10  5 10 10 10 10 11
 11 10 10 10  9 10 10 10 10 11
 11 10 10 10  9 10 10 10 10 11

  ^                  ^                      ^  -- these would probably be results of the
                                                       point-radiating nature of the sensor - helpful
                                                       for my intended application.

Anyway, you all get what I mean. I'd imagine this sort of thing would be
really helpful in robot/computer vision systems, and other areas.

ANY leads on technology like this, ranging from heresay/legend to prices and
distributors, would be greatly appreciated.

Regards,

Andrew

andrewl@cs.anu.edu.au