Visual quality evaluation of the multi-camera visualization in automotive surround view systems

Surround view camera systems are nowadays commonly provided/ offered by most of the car manufactures. Currently, a considerable number of different multi-camera visualization systems exist in the automotive sector, which are difficult to evaluate and compare in terms of visual performance. This is mainly due to the lack of standardized approaches for evaluation, unpredictable 3D input content, un-predictable outdoor conditions, non-standardized display units as well as visual quality requirements that are not clearly identified by the car manufactures. Recently there has been IEEE-P2020 initiative established that concerns standards for image quality for automotive systems. In this paper, we address the problem of reliably evaluating multicamera automotive surround view systems in terms of visual quality. We propose a test methodology and an efficient test system platform with a video playback system and real camera input images captured from the vehicle, which enables visual quality monitoring subjectively on the head unit display and objectively by the proposed objective quality metrics.