This week, I focused on improving the robustness of the attitude estimation pipeline and validating its consistency across different image inputs. I refined the integration between the plate solver output and our calibrated camera model, which helped reduce inconsistencies in the computed orientations.
I need to begin connecting the attitude outputs to the next stage of the pipeline and figure out how to convert these orientations into preliminary latitude and longitude estimates. This is is critical for meeting our system accuracy goals.
We verified our subsystem by testing star detection robustness under noise, blur, and occlusion, and by validating plate solving and attitude estimation using known WCS outputs, measuring angular residual errors and solve success rates. For validation, we use ground-truth datasets from NASA SkyView and Stellarium to compare estimated boresight RA/Dec against known values and compute angular and position error relative to the ≤10 km requirement.