Inertial Attitude Verification for ADCS Test Beds by Single Camera Image Processing

Test beds for attitude determination and control systems (ADCS) are an essential tool during the development and qualification phase of satellites which are often tested under simulated mission conditions. One major challenge is to verify a complete ADCS with its sensors without introducing noise to these sensors with testing equipment. Active sensors might interfere with magnetic field sensors, sun sensors or the optical instruments of the satellite.This paper introduces a cost-effective approach which determines a satellite’s inertial attitude inside a testbed by only using images from a single or multiple commercial cameras. The software utilizes so-called ArUco markers which need to be physically affixed to the satellite and testbed itself. The attitude estimation can then be done with help of a software package developed by the authors. This software utilizes the open-source ArUco software library for detecting the markers, their position and orientation in the camera coordinate frame. Since it only uses images to do so, there is no interference with sensors or instruments of the satellite.