Structured light vision systems are based on the fact that the pixel location of light in an image has a unique association with the object depth. However, their applications are mainly limited to the properties of the object surface and the lighting conditions. This paper presents a robust vision system for accurate acquisition of 3-D surface data based on optimal structured light. To achieve depth measurement for a dynamic scene, the data acquisition must be performed with only a single image. Our special arrangement makes the image of the light stripe remaining sharp while the background becomes blurred. Moreover, a dynamic programming approach is proposed to track the optimal path while the laser beam is invisible or divergent under extreme condition. The principle and necessary mathematics for implementing the algorithm are presented. The robustness of the system against uncalibrated errors is demonstrated.