Oh, the things you can do with a Vicon motion capture system and an unlimited research budget! (More coolness from ETH Zurich, via Robots.net)
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Oh, the things you can do with a Vicon motion capture system and an unlimited research budget! (More coolness from ETH Zurich, via Robots.net)
You need to be a member of diydrones to add comments!
Comments
@Squalish
Precision vision recognition would be less important if an induction charging system was used along with a magnetic capture system. Basically, an electromagnet on the charging platform which is activated by a proximity sensor, and a magnet on the bottom plate of the quad. All the quad has to do is hover close enough and slock, it's captured. I think GPS would be good enough to get the quad close enough. Once charging is completed, the electromagnet turns off, and the quad is on its way.
Let's mash up the first and the second posts for a moment:
One application of a visual external control system is 'docking' to a base station with a charger. Some precision is needed to do this correctly.
Reminds me of my misspent childhood, spent in an arcade playing Galaga.
I like the idea of automatic charging. I was thinking of doing something like that for use in the field. You install solar powered charging stations at certain waypoints, and the quad automatically lands at those stations to recharge before taking off again to continue its journey. If everyone who owns a arducopter puts one of these stations in their backyard, we can have our quads fly all over the world autonomously!
For one object, MP is likely not needed. For instance, Optitrack systems use VGA cameras at 120fps for decent mocap of a body in a 10x10 space. But the latency is around 10-20ms--which could be an issue with ETH-type flying experiments and more of an issue when on-board.
very impressive. There's definitely some smart brains that put some time into putting that together. These guys just keep knocking things out so quickly too.
One reason why reversing the vision system paradigm can't work (today) is CPU and battery power.
Vicon systems are sampling in the Khz range, were we all know most quadcopter flight boards sample (for the IMU) at 12-22Mhz (though the Arduino Due will greatly change that at 92Mhz :) ). And the resolution of the vicon imagers are in the megapixel range (at least the more recent ones). Put all that capability on a multicopter and your weight and battery limitations goes out door (1min flight time, 10lbs?)
Those that have tried to minimize the payload, VGA at 30fps (x4 for that matter), won't cut it for the maneuvers ETH is achieving. Mind that, now make it all work outdoors (!). Makes for a very, very challenging problem.
Now there are a number of folks trying to use sonar, Kinects (still heavy for outdoors), and lidar (Stanford), which look more robust, but processing power isn't there yet. The closest I've seen is with the AR.Drone: it has the cpu power (400+mhz DaVinci)--but the vga cameras run at 15fps, battery life is quick, and the motors have no real lifting capability. Then again, it can achieve 2-3 levels down from the ETH system: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X4C7iZZzyBM&feature=related
@Mike, yes the battery person needs credits. Lots of LiPos.
yes, i have seen it, i don't know if it is always used. a very different design from what I have been planning, and I have been thinking a lot about it. but i think i will maybe still go with my original design, but I was glad to see it and to consider it.
but I can imagine the intern all the same, always managing batteries, like a modern day cinderella...
@Mike : I thought they had automatic landing to a recharging pad ?
@arashi- Regarding turning a Vicon system inside-out: We already did this three years ago... http://www.diydrones.com/profiles/blogs/micro-helicopter-hovering-in Actually I got the idea of turning a Vicon system inside-out after seeing a talk by MIT Prof. Jonathan How, the first person (with many smart people in his lab) to use Vicon systems in this manner.
The above video is still impressive! Perhaps someday we can have little decorative drones flying around indoor atriums- they would be like birds except they don't, ummm, deposit stuff randomly.
It obviously can but I just cant figure out how?..
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