SplatPose: On-Device Outdoor AR Pose Estimation Using Gaussian Splatting

Outdoor AR applications on mobile devices need accurate estimates for the pose of the device. In this paper, we develop SplatPose, a novel pose estimation technique that uses a data-driven 3D modeling technique called Gaussian Splatting. SplatPose uses a trained Gaussian Splatting model to render an image at an estimated device location, then matches features with the camera image to estimate pose. % Because this matching can be fast, SplatPose can, in theory, estimate pose entirely on a mobile device, while existing approaches cannot. To this end, SplatPose trains Gaussian Splatting models to be robust to appearance changes, thereby improving accuracy. It also incorporates a novel fast renderer to improve rendering speed. Using an AR pose estimation benchmark dataset, we show that SplatPose outperforms the state-of-the-art in terms of accuracy, and is up to an order of magnitude faster on a mobile device.