Society of Robots - Robot Forum
Electronics => Electronics => Topic started by: gamefreak on January 30, 2007, 09:40:39 PM
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Well i've been reading through the tutorials on vision because i was inspired by a discovery channel show for a robot that can see.
The only thing i got from the tutorials is that i need to read each pixel and then see if it matches up to what i want, But how do i go about this? Do i need a certain type of controller? Also what would be the best kind of memory, flash?
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You'd have to be more precise. Memory for what? And as for reading pixels, it depends on your equipment. Some cameras are made especially for microcontroller-based robots, like the CMUcam and the AVRcam. Another possibility is to use a laptop/PDA with a simple webcam, and interface with whatever API your platform support...
So, the short answer is, you need to decide on what platform you're using before you even worry about how to read pixel values. But if you're interested in serious vision research, you're probably going to want to look at a linux/PC based platform, either with an onboard PC and webcams/HD cameras, or a mobile, remote controlled "drone", with a wireless camera system and some video acquisition devices, as someone else here is doing.
I'm personally going with my own laptop, running linux, and using two USB 2.0 webcams. I believe that's the simplest option for a robot of a moderate size (mine will be about 4.5' high).
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if you own a webcam, try this:
http://www.roborealm.com/
it will let you experiment a little, and it hides all the complicated stuff.
its a little buggy, but they continue to add neat features and improve the software.
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I'll second Admin's reference to RoboRealm. I've started playing with it, and it is an incredibly easy to use vision system that is also fairly powerful. The support on their forums is awesome, and they fix bugs and add features with alarming regularity.
I will be using RoboRealm on MicroRaptor for first-level vision processing, for sure.
- Jon