Predicting Vehicle Pose in Six Degrees of Freedom from Single Image in Real-World Traffic Environments Using Deep Pretrained Convolutional Networks and Modified Centernet

Abstract

The study focuses on intelligent driving, emphasizing the importance of recognizing nearby vehicles and estimating their positions using visual input from a single image. It employs transfer learning techniques, integrating deep convolutional networks’ features into a modified CenterNet model for six-degrees-of-freedom (6DoF) vehicle position estimation. To address the vanishing gradient problem, the model incorporates simultaneous double convolutional blocks with skip connections. Utilizing the ApolloCar3D dataset, which surpasses KITTI in comprehensiveness, the study evaluates pretrained models’ performance using mean average precision (mAP). The recommended model, Center-DenseNet201, achieves a mAP of 11.82% for relative translation thresholds (A3DP-Rel) and 39.92% for absolute translation thresholds (A3DP-Abs). These findings highlight the effectiveness of pretrained models in the modified architecture, enhancing vehicle posture prediction accuracy from single images. The research contributes to autonomous vehicle development, fostering safer and more efficient navigation systems in real-world traffic scenarios.