pointcloud_crop_box

A ROS 2 package for filtering 3D point clouds using an axis-aligned cropping box. It subscribes to a sensor_msgs/msg/PointCloud2, transforms it into a target frame, filters it using a configurable box, and publishes both the filtered cloud and a 3D bounding box message.

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Features

• Subscribes to raw point cloud data (e.g., from a LiDAR)
• Filters the cloud using a configurable 3D bounding box
• Supports TF2 transformation to a target frame
• Option to invert the box (i.e., remove inside instead of outside)
• Publishes the filtered cloud and a 3D bounding box marker

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ROS 2 Node

pointcloud_crop_box_node

Subscribes

• <input_topic> (sensor_msgs/msg/PointCloud2) Input topic containing raw point cloud data (default: /points_raw)

Publishes

• <output_topic> (sensor_msgs/msg/PointCloud2) Filtered point cloud after box cropping (default: /points_filtered)

• ~/filter_bounding_box (vision_msgs/msg/BoundingBox3D) The axis-aligned box used for filtering, for visualization or debugging

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Parameters

• input_topic [string, default: "/points_raw"]: Topic to subscribe for input PointCloud2 data.
• output_topic [string, default: "/points_filtered"]: Topic to publish filtered PointCloud2 data.
• target_frame [string, default: "base_link"]: Target TF frame to transform the point cloud into.
• min_x [double, default: -1.0]: Minimum X boundary of the crop box.
• max_x [double, default: 1.0]: Maximum X boundary of the crop box.
• min_y [double, default: -1.0]: Minimum Y boundary of the crop box.
• max_y [double, default: 1.0]: Maximum Y boundary of the crop box.
• min_z [double, default: -1.0]: Minimum Z boundary of the crop box.
• max_z [double, default: 1.0]: Maximum Z boundary of the crop box.
• negative [bool, default: false]: If true, keeps points outside the crop box instead of inside.
• visualize_bounding_box [bool, default: true]: Whether to publish a visualization marker for the bounding box.

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Example Launch

To show the result of the filtering you can follow our autonomy example in husarion-ugv-autonomy to get measurements of pointcloud.

Build from Source

Create Workspace

mkdir ~/husarion_ws
cd ~/husarion_ws
git clone https://github.com/husarion/pointcloud_crop_box.git src/pointcloud_crop_box

Build

sudo rosdep init
rosdep update --rosdistro $ROS_DISTRO
rosdep install --from-paths src -y -i

source /opt/ros/$ROS_DISTRO/setup.bash
colcon build --symlink-install --packages-up-to pointcloud_crop_box --cmake-args -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release

Run configured launch:

source install/setup.bash
ros2 launch  pointcloud_crop_box pointcloud_crop_box_launch.py