Navigation by Skylight Polarization via Rayleigh Model Optimization on a Road Vehicle
This method estimates a vehicle's absolute heading by analyzing polarization patterns from a camera viewing the sky. It uses a pinhole camera model and a single-scattering Rayleigh model to predict expected polarization based on vehicle position and time. By optimizing this prediction against actual measurements using a weighted error function, the system accurately determines heading, achieving sub-degree errors and outperforming other methods.