MCGS-SLAM: A Multi-Camera SLAM Framework Using Gaussian Splatting for High-Fidelity Mapping
This addresses the need for high-fidelity mapping in robotics and autonomous driving by enabling reconstruction of side-view regions that monocular setups miss, though it builds incrementally on existing Gaussian Splatting methods.
The paper tackles the problem of limited robustness and geometric coverage in dense SLAM by introducing MCGS-SLAM, the first purely RGB-based multi-camera SLAM system using 3D Gaussian Splatting, which consistently yields accurate trajectories and photorealistic reconstructions while outperforming monocular baselines.
Recent progress in dense SLAM has primarily targeted monocular setups, often at the expense of robustness and geometric coverage. We present MCGS-SLAM, the first purely RGB-based multi-camera SLAM system built on 3D Gaussian Splatting (3DGS). Unlike prior methods relying on sparse maps or inertial data, MCGS-SLAM fuses dense RGB inputs from multiple viewpoints into a unified, continuously optimized Gaussian map. A multi-camera bundle adjustment (MCBA) jointly refines poses and depths via dense photometric and geometric residuals, while a scale consistency module enforces metric alignment across views using low-rank priors. The system supports RGB input and maintains real-time performance at large scale. Experiments on synthetic and real-world datasets show that MCGS-SLAM consistently yields accurate trajectories and photorealistic reconstructions, usually outperforming monocular baselines. Notably, the wide field of view from multi-camera input enables reconstruction of side-view regions that monocular setups miss, critical for safe autonomous operation. These results highlight the promise of multi-camera Gaussian Splatting SLAM for high-fidelity mapping in robotics and autonomous driving.