Objectives  Few corresponding points can easily affect the calculation of image pose information, increase the difficulty of constructing a regional network in an aerial triangulation solution, so that lead to problems such as image stitching misalignment, incorrect bundle adjustment results or even failure. In order to better complete the matching of unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) images, this paper proposes a robust UAV image matching algorithm considering log-polar description and position scale distance.

  Methods  Firstly, a Gaussian multi-scale image collection is established and feature points are extracted. Secondly, the descriptors are constructed using log-polar coordinates, and a descriptor suitable for UAV image characteristics is established. Then, the feature matching is performed by the distance function of position and scale constraints. Finally, the mode seeking and fast sample consensus method are used to eliminate the outliner and complete the extraction of correspondence.

  Results  The image obtained by four-rotor UAV is used as the data source, and a comparison experiment of image matching with scale invariant feature transform (SIFT) algorithm and synthetic aperture radar-scale invariant feature transform (SAR-SIFT) algorithm is carried out. The experimental results show that a 210-dimensional log-polar coordinate descriptor is constructed through the gradient location and orientation histogram. The descriptor can better describe the feature points in 10 directions through the circular neighborhood, making the matching results more robust. The position scale Euclidean distance matching function established by integrating factors such as position and scale can better calculate the UAV image matching relationship, and match more correct corresponding points. In terms of the number of correct corresponding points extracted under the same parameter settings, the proposed algorithm is significantly more than the other two algorithms, and in terms of the root mean square error of the matching results, the algorithm in this article is also significantly better than the two compared algorithms.

  Conclusions  The proposed algorithm can better extract the corresponding points of UAV images.