A flexible approach to reassembling thin artifacts of unknown geometry

We present a novel 3D reassembly method for fragmented, thin objects with unknown geometry. Unlike past methods, we do not make any restrictive assumptions about the overall shape of the object, or its painted texture. Our key observation is that regardless of the object's shape, matching fragments will have similar geometry and photometry along and across their adjoining regions. We begin by encoding the scale variability of each fragment's boundary contour in a multichannel, 2D image representation. Using this multichannel boundary contour representation, we identify matching sub-contours via 2D partial image registration. We then align the fragments by minimizing the distance between their adjoining regions while simultaneously ensuring geometric continuity across them. The configuration of the fragments as they are incrementally matched and aligned form a graph structure that we use to improve subsequent matches. By detecting cycles in this graph, we identify subsets of fragments with interdependent alignments. We then minimize the error within the subsets to achieve a globally optimal alignment. We leverage user feedback to cull the otherwise exponential search space; after each new match is found and aligned, it is presented to a user for confirmation or rejection. Using ceramic pottery as the driving example, we demonstrate the accuracy and efficiency of our method on six real-world datasets. (C) 2012 Elsevier Masson SAS. All rights reserved.