Axially distributed sensing for three-dimensional imaging with unknown sensor positions

Recently, an axially distributed sensing system was proposed for three-dimensional (3D) imaging where the sensors are distributed along the optical axis. In this previously reported system, a priori knowledge of exact sensor positions was required for 3D image reconstruction. In this Letter, we present an axially distributed sensing with unknown sensor positions along the optical axis. In this system, only the relative positions of two sensors are needed, whereas all other sensor positions are assumed unknown. Experiments are presented to illustrate the feasibility of the proposed system and illustrate the visual quality of reconstructed 3D images by using the proposed calibrated sensor positions. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first report on axially distributed sensing with unknown sensor positions. (C) 2011 Optical Society of America