Alignment Optimization

[kalebphipps]

Due to the differentiable kinematic and raytracing powering ARTIST, gradients should be able to optimize the alignment parameters. However, this functionality has not yet been implemented.

Describe the solution you'd like
Alignment optimization should be implemented in ARTIST. Importantly, two types of alignment optimization are required:

1. Image-Based: Given a calibration image, the alignment parameters are optimized using differentiable raytracing and the loss from the image.
2. Motor-Position Based: If a calibration image is not available but only the calibration metadata, i.e. the motor positions, then the loss based on these positions should be used to perform the optimization.

Technical details
To realize this optimization, several steps must be taken:

• The kinematic must be checked to be fully differentiable.
• The raytracing must be checked and adjusted to be fully differentiable.
• The kinematic parameters contained in the data (e.g. PAINT) must be correctly loaded into ARTIST.
• The positions of the heliostats and towers must be correctly converted from WSG84 coordinates to field coordinates.
• The loss from the motor positions must be used in the differentiable kinematic model to optimize alignment.
• The loss from the image using the raytracing must be used to perform an alignment optimization.

Planned Deadline: November 7, 2024.