Feature interference in free form template matching

Template matching is a useful method in the reconstruction of free form surfaces. In this paper, matching of free form surfaces with parameterized templates is studied with the emphasis on feature interference. By their definitions in 3Dimensional space, free form features are introduced, analyzed and parameterized first. An optimization function based on a Hausdorff-like shape distance measuring method is proposed and applied as measuring method between the digitalized model surface and the parameterized feature template. The proposed method not only can fit isolated free form features, but also works when a feature is interfered by other free form features in some specified conditions. A series of numerical experiments have been conducted to demonstrate the proposed methods based on ACIS and Open Inventor. Fitting strategies are proposed as well.