LiDAR (Light Detection and Ranging) is a useful sensing technique and an important source of data for autonomous vehicles (AVs). In this publication we present the results of a study undertaken to understand the impact of automotive paint on LiDAR performance along with a methodology used to conduct this study. Our approach consists of evaluating the average reflected intensity output by different LiDAR sensor models when tested with different types of automotive paints. The paints were chosen to represent common paints found on vehicles in Singapore. The experiments were conducted with LiDAR sensors commonly used by autonomous vehicle (AV) developers and OEMs. The paints used were also selected based on those observed in real-world conditions. This stems from a desire to model real-world performance of actual sensing systems when exposed to the physical world. The goal is then to inform regulators of AVs in Singapore of the impact of automotive paint on LiDAR performance, so that they can determine testing standards and specifications which will better reflect real-world performance and also better assess the adequacy of LiDAR systems installed for local AV operations. The tests were conducted for a combination of 13 different paint panels and 3 LiDAR sensors. In general, it was observed that darker coloured paints have lower reflection intensity whereas lighter coloured paints exhibited higher intensity values.
@article{arxiv.2309.01346,
title = {White paper on LiDAR performance against selected Automotive Paints},
author = {James Lee Wei Shung and Paul Hibbard and Roshan Vijay and Lincoln Ang Hon Kin and Niels de Boer},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2309.01346},
year = {2023}
}
Comments
23 pages, 29 figures. This white paper was developed with support from the Urban Mobility Grand Challenge Fund by the Land Transport Authority of Singapore (No. UMGC-L010). For associated dataset, see https://researchdata.ntu.edu.sg/dataset.xhtml?persistentId=doi:10.21979/N9/CGDKMZ