Slashdot Mirror
MIT Drone Finds Its Way Using Kinect Vision
garymortimer writes "This MIT multicopter is able to fly in GPS denied environments by creating a 3D map of its surroundings on the fly (no pun intended) based on point clouds generated by a Kinect. Also pretty handy for avoiding trees and other obstacles outside at low level. This processing is onboard, unlike other systems that depend on motion capture rigs."
Remote Objective Forensic Lead Copter.
before the Kinect came out?
Frankly, I'm pretty sure most of this stuff *already* existed before the Kinect came out. I'm just wondering exactly how much Microsoft mass producing the hardware saved the researchers on having to make their own devices.
I imagine it's quite a bit since we went from "hardly any talk about robot vision except about how goddamned hard it is" to "A NEW ROBOT/CAMERA/WHAT HAVE YOU USING THE KINECT AS ITS EYEBALLS!!!!!" every week once the Kinect was out for a month.
I'm complaining, yeah, but I'm also trying to put things into perspective. These aren't leaps and bounds of tech, they're just leaps and bounds of people actually making use of the damned hardware since they don't have to sell their second child to pay for it.
Crowdsourcing I guess? Instead of 2-3 sterile environments trying to figure out robot vision algorithms, now a bajillion institutes and hobbyists are working on the problem. I guess one way or the other, this is a big step in the fields of autonomous robotics and so on. Now if only we could work on the goddamned speech recognition software... The hardware for that's been around for ages and yet people haven't been messing about with it as much as they do with the Kinect.
This MIT multicopter is able to fly in GPS denied environments by creating a 3D map of its surroundings on the fly (no pun intended) based on point clouds generated by a Kinect.
No pun intended = "I came up with a weak pun, but I don't want people to blame me for it"
#DeleteChrome
As much as it's unpopular, we should all thank Microsoft for putting this great piece of kit out in the public and even moreso for not going after the API which is floatng out there like many corporations do nowadays.
I call it 'The Aristocrats'
According to TFV the "multicopter" uses onboard processing to find reference points between successive video frames, which it then uses to determine how fast and how far the drone moves.
However, the actual map generation and navigation is handled by a separate computer.
How can I believe you when you tell me what I don't want to hear?
These aren't leaps and bounds of tech, they're just leaps and bounds of people actually making use of the damned hardware since they don't have to sell their second child to pay for it.
Crowdsourcing I guess? Instead of 2-3 sterile environments trying to figure out robot vision algorithms, now a bajillion institutes and hobbyists are working on the problem
Working on *which* problem exactly?
I don't see any of those people working on artificial vision algorithms. What they are doing is using a "good enough" vision algorithm which comes bundled with the hardware to develop applications for artificial vision.
It's because the researchers couldn't build factories in China to pump out their equipment by the million. Mass production, economies of scale and all that.
If you hired a team of engineers to invent and build you a one-off car, how much do you think it would cost?
How can I believe you when you tell me what I don't want to hear?
Here's a question: All these university researchers are using Wii controllers and Kinect devices to do research. How come they didn't invent this stuff themselves?
They did, long ago. This sort of thing is usually developed as a demonstrated concept in an academic lab. Proof of concept devices are ungainly, expensive, and incomplete, but they show that the academics' idea works and has potential for further development. Then companies take that public domain knowledge and make products from it. These are much cheaper and better packaged. Now the products are part of our technology culture, so they're natural tools for the next round of academics to use as tools for further innovation.
Is it because they couldn't think in mass-market terms so their solutions were overly complex and expensive?
Now here's another question: Why don't Nintendo and Microsoft make developers kits for their devices sans game console? Or even better, make the open source (I can dream)?
Microsoft is releasing Kinect for PC with an SDK supposedly intended to enable this sort of development. They chose to leave the output from the existing Kinect interface unencrypted, too, resulting in the already large homebrew scene demonstrated in storied like this.
"I zero-index my hamsters" - Willtor (147206)
Depends on the car. Also it depends on what that car could do that other cars couldn't, say something like "fly", and how cheaply it could be made and how the usage could be expanded to markets not quite the intended one. Prototyping is expensive, and I'm sure that Microsoft's prototypes of the Kenect were very expensive, but they had a plan to sell millions of the thing, making it less expensive for others to use and deploy in creative ways Microsoft probably never thought of.
The point being, good R&D builds products that exceed original scope for the design. What I call the unintended consequences of invention. You know, guy playing with Radar discovers it can cook food. Radar is expensive until Amana takes the idea and mass manufactures the "Radar Range".
Wait till Ford start putting these things in cars.
Agent K: A *person* is smart. People are dumb, stupid, panicky animals, and you know it.