Implementation of a Self-Consistent Stereo Processing Chain for 3D Stereo Reconstruction of the Lunar Landing Sites

The department for Planetary Geodesy at Technical University Berlin is developing routines for photogrammetric processing of planetary image data to derive 3D representations of planetary surfaces. The Integrated Software for Imagers and Spectrometers (ISIS) software (Anderson et al., 2004), developed by USGS, Flagstaff, is readily available, open source, and very well documented. Hence, ISIS was chosen as a prime processing platform and tool kit. However, ISIS does not provide a full photogrammetric stereo processing chain. Several components like image matching, bundle block adjustment (until recently) or digital terrain model (DTM) interpolation from 3D object points are missing. Our group aims to complete this photogrammetric stereo processing chain by implementing the missing components, taking advantage of already existing ISIS classes and functionality. We report here on the current status of the development of our stereo processing chain and its first application on the Lunar Apollo landing sites.