VEHICLE EXTERIOR ENVIRONMENT RECOGNITION APPARATUS

A vehicle exterior environment recognition apparatus includes a monocular distance calculator, a relaxation distance calculator, and an updated distance calculator. The monocular distance calculator calculates a monocular distance of a three-dimensional object from a luminance image generated by an imaging unit. The relaxation distance calculator calculates a relaxation distance of the three-dimensional object from two luminance images generated by two imaging units based on a degree of image matching between the two luminance images determined using a threshold more lenient than another threshold used to determine the degree of image matching to generate a stereo distance of the three-dimensional object. The updated distance calculator calculates an updated distance of the three-dimensional object by mixing the monocular distance and the relaxation distance at a predetermined ratio.