ARETE ASSOCIATES — Department of Defense SBIR Phase I: N201-042

Description

The situational awareness, target tracking, navigation, electronic warfare, and communications capabilities of the US Navy’s submarine fleet are all enabled, in part or in whole, by the instruments of the submarines’ photonics masts. Providing the highest quality imagery for such a wide-varying set of operations presents some unique challenges. Maintaining situational awareness, for example, requires fast panning across the full 360° of azimuth in order to detect, identify, and track surface vessels and other targets in the area. However, even a slight movement of the periscope can result in severe image blurring, and the rolling shutter of the Complementary Metal-oxide Semiconductor (CMOS)-based imaging systems of the Low Profile Photonics Mast (LPPM) can cause equally severe geometric distortions. When pushed to its maximum slew rate, the MTI periscope will blur its imagery by over 100 pixels, essentially nullifying any attempts at target detection, identification, or tracking. The rolling shutter in the Low Profile Photonics Mast (LPPM) further distorts imagery during motion, introducing geometric skewing and spatial aliasing of image features. To address these issues, Areté proposes development of the Rolling Shutter and Motion Blur algorithm (RSMB), a fully-automated and real-time image enhancement capability for submarine periscopes. RSMB will correct the rolling shutter distortion and motion blur independently, allowing it to be effective on global shutter systems, such as the MTI, and rolling shutter systems, such as the LPPM. This independence allows RSMB to be integrated into virtually any camera system, from submarines to surface ships to UAVs. By utilizing the data from the submarine’s inertial measurement unit (IMU), RSMB will be ideally suited for the sparse scene texture of the maritime environment. Areté’s Phase I plan will demonstrate the RSMB capability using real periscope imagery. In addition, Areté will implement the RSMB algorithms in CUDA during the Phase I Option, allowing for full operational implementation in Phase II.