Infared in Next Year's Game
 

This is somewhat speculation, but I was looking at some footage form this year's kickoff (I'm making somewhat of a short documentary on FIRST, and there are quite a few good sound bites from the kickoff (though Dean's are all too long to really be 'soud bites' except for the line "Everybody, likes, Robots."))

ANYway, at one point, Dean, Dave, and Woodie were discussing the IR sensors. Dave said "Do you have to use IR sensors? No. But we supply all the software and the servos and we make it as easy as possible, so why wouldn't you. But do you need to use them? No. That doesn't say anything about next year, however."

Now, this is pure speculation, obviously, but from what he said, it sounded that next year teams would HAVE to use IR for some aspect of the game. More than just autonomous. Now, I have no idea how far ahead they plan out the games, so it could have been only an off the cuff statement. But to me, it sounded that next year, IR would be a necessity in one form or another.

Thoughts?

Re: Infared in Next Year's Game
 

My team has been speculating about this too (and a large part of it wanted to make a bad decision to use IR this year based on this quote). I can't imagine how it could possibly become mandatory next year. Even for very important elements of the game, there are always multiple ways to go about it, it defenitley is not in the spirit to make IR a neccessity. I think they may have just wanted to encourage more people to use it.

IR as a whole seems to have went pretty badly because of all sorts of interference people were reporting. After this showing, one wonders if IR will be back at all. I think they should spend money on some other interesting sensor system (hmmm, cant really think of anything practical right now, but im sure they can :) ) unless they can improve IR significantly.

Re: Infared in Next Year's Game
 

It definately sounds like IR will be more important next year (or so was the plan). I don't necessarily agree that there is any problem with it this year with interference or anything else. It all depends, obviously, on the design of the housing mechanism of the sensor, correctly limiting its input and reducing reflection error ... but the IR portion of our code has worked every single time at 2 different regionals (we use a specific pulse width plus first is monitoring for stray ir signals, so that can't really be a problem ... and dealing with reflections is part of the game/design challenge ... remember, it ain't supposed to be easy!).

Re: Infared in Next Year's Game
 

I might have to eat my Red Sox hat next year, but FIRST will never force us to use the IR sensors.

In this year's game the IR beacon was used to show where a stationary object was. A taped line was also supplied to help find the stationary object. Because it's a stationary object you could count wheel revolutions or even use dead reckoning.

I think what Dave was eluding to was a situation where it's the only sensor you could use. For instance, if the mobile goal was randomly placed on your side of the field. To show robots where the mobile goal is, an IR beacon could be installed on the mobile goal.

That's my $0.02 on the issue :cool:

Re: Infared in Next Year's Game
 

I believe the autonomous should be a little more important than this year, but I do not think limiting us to infared as the only sensor input would be a wise move. That would not be very open to creativity, and kind of takes the fun out of the autonomous.

IR is useful, but I can think of combinations of certain sensors that would be more useful depending on the situation... :cool:

Mrs
 

I'm probably going to be wrong, but I think that the IR will be like the reflective tape: available to us, but not mandatory.

I'm not really sure why I feel this way...it's a hunch. :)

Re: Infared in Next Year's Game
 

I think it will be used in an integral, super important part of the game next year, and that in order to accomplish your task the IR sensors would provide you with the easiest way to accomplish it.

Re: Infared in Next Year's Game
 

why? what's the point? Part of the game is to decide what is the best way to play it. FIRST is pretty good at making this decision a tuff one. Why would it decide to give people only one option?

Re: Infared in Next Year's Game
 

I don't know if you saw all the wonderful threads about speculation for this year's game... everything came up, and the same will happen in the upcoming offseason. Lavery is a funny guy, sometimes he'll throw out an idea he thought of. For all we know, he thought of it while on stage and just said it, and by now he isn't even considering implementing something with IR sensors. It's all in good fun, don't believe everything you hear ;) They're not going to give you enough bark to bite on before releasing the game next year. Plus, if they do "force" you to use IR sensors, teams can still do dead reckoning systems or use sensors similar to the StangPS and similar things I've seen with other teams. I'd personally recommend that you look more into things like Wildstands Positioning System (StangPS) and learn how to make systems like that in preparation for next year, and not so much on how to find an IR beacon ;)

Re: Infared in Next Year's Game
 

Maybe the robots themselves will have an IR sensor and our robots can recognize each other and cooperate (or compete or cooperpete or whatever). In this case, it would have to be mandatory that you broadcast.

Re: Infared in Next Year's Game
 

Wow, that is a really awesome idea and im already convinced that thats what its going to be. That is just beautiful. Imagine the possibilities. True autonomy may really happen.

Andrew, I'm going to believe everything you say from now on, you are awesome.

Re: Infared in Next Year's Game
 

Um, just to get it on the record, is that a clean or dirty red sock :D ?

-Kevin

Re: Infared in Next Year's Game
 

I was thinking about that, the reason I don't think FIRST would do that is because... IR sensors are one directional. Sure, you can transfer some information from one to another similar to a remote does with a TV, but you'd have to aim the sensor at the other robot. From what I've seen this year and last, it's a pretty big step to do something like that to have the sensor track and find the other robots... it just seems too complicated to be used next year... maybe once teams get more comfortable with autonomous, I'd think. I do have a hunch that robots will communicate with each other (actually I thought they would this year) through a secondary radio system... which wouldn't require the robots to point towards the other to transmit... I think we'll see something similar to that before teams are forced to make a system use IR and find another robot and transmit... while still tracking that robot. Just seems like too many variables/problems to be introduced when teams are still having so many troubles with the simple autonomous modes as they are now.

Re: Infared in Next Year's Game
 

Communicating with each other may be in fact more complex. What communication standard do you use. Even more important, what do you communicate? I think this is less realistic than each robot having a beacon of some sort.

Though im not sure, i imagine it would be pretty simple to make a omnidirectional IR beacon. First of all, FIRST already does this on the field. Second, i think it can be even simpler than what FIRST appears to have (several small area beacons) by just shining a single beacon at a reflective sphere (say a 2x ball :) )

Re: Infared in Next Year's Game
 

Interesting comment. What path of logic has led you to that conclusion?
Dead reckoning systems are wonderful - as long as you know where everything is located, and can predict with reasonable accuracy how well your robot will navigate. But what happens if your target location is imprecisely identified?

Line following systems are great - as long as the lines lead to where you want to go. But what happens when they don't?

Sooner or later, robots must make the leap from structured to unstructured environments. The only way to do that is to rely on sensor systems that do not require fiducial marks or calibrated hard points to guide the machine.
Kevin, you supply the salt and pepper, and I will bring the ketchup. I am hoping that some condiments may be needed later this year.... :)

-dave

Interesting ideas for summer research: Sensor fusion. Handyboard IR comm. Lego IR Towers. Pseudolytes.

Re: Infared in Next Year's Game
 

I'd personally like to see a GPS-like system. Just 2 or 3 beacons around the field that robots can use to assist in positioning. Then teams can use that in conjunction with other sensors to find the "imprecisely identified" targets, which if they're moving or something similar... it will make it a fun autonomous mode. I'd like to see a system where you must rely on more than one system like you said. Not just infrared sensors, or just dead reckoning, but sort of a mix (maybe you need to get to a certain point before your in a line of sight with the infrared sensor due to a wall/obstruction in the way at the beginning?) I'd love to see a really good challenge in autonomous... and have enough points devoted to it that teams will spend more focus on it... because I know that's why we haven't put too much emphasis into autonomous, there's just not enough value in it to do anything crazy... but if multipliers or something come back for doing something in autonomous... or even autonomous at the end of a match.

For example, I know one thing I really would love to see is where teams can choose when to go in autonomous. So, if say they want to be in autonomous the last 30 seconds of a match, they get a certain amount of points... however other teams don't necessarily go in autonomous as well, so it's like.. the robot literally has to be able to think and counteract what the other team drivers may do.. but if you can do it well... you'd be very well rewarded, making a very interesting twist to the game. So maybe something like... for every second you stay in auto (if you exit auto before the end of the match it voids though unless you restart it and if you restart it you only get counted for the last bit). Just an idea I've played around with in my head the past few months.

Re: Infared in Next Year's Game
 

OK, I'll bite. What's a pseudolyte?

Re: Infared in Next Year's Game
 

You can do a GPS like system with what we have now. (x,y, and direction) What you need for location to be completely unabiguous is three sensors that can tell the direction to the the beacons relative to your robot's personal co-ordinate system. The sensors need to be arrainged so that they are never in a line with respect to both beacons. Though if you want to get fancy you can even accomodate that to some extent.

Only two sensors are required if you just want position and don't mind a little confusion when you cross the "equator" between the beacons.

ChrisH

Re: Infared in Next Year's Game
 

Uh oh... The hat's clean right now, maybe I should put it away so it's clean for January:D I'm not sure what condiment would go best, A1.. A1 BOLD maybe...

Re: Infared in Next Year's Game
 

I believe the correst spelling is pseudolite. And it literally means pseudo-satellite, as in a land based GPS system. This link explians the pseudolite research being done at Stanford for such projects as NASA's Rovers.

Re: Infared in Next Year's Game
 

I hope they use IR next year - I was put off by it at first, didnt want to mess with interrupts while I was learning C at the same time

but when I realized you can use the IR beacons just by polling the interrupt flag bits, and you dont have to enable any interrupts, it was a walk in the park

they worked great for us - I just wish we had put the sensors on servos so we could track the beacons, instead of using fixed direction sensors.

Next year? Definately! bring it on!

Re: Infared in Next Year's Game
 

Agreed.

When I heard the quote, I first took it to mean just that autonomous mode would be much more of a necessity next year.

Re: Infared in Next Year's Game
 

Geez, I mis-read your original post. Eating a hat is more palatable than a skanky sock anyday (though the nylon portion can be a tad chewy). Suddenly, this isn't as much fun as I envisioned :).

-Kevin

Re: Infared in Next Year's Game
 

I agree with most people. I have a feeling that it will be there, and if you use it, and it works right, your life will be easier, but I don't think it will be mandatory. Though at one point at the UTC regional, a judge came to our pit and made us promise we'd make one of our younger students learn IR for next year. So you never know.

Re: Infared in Next Year's Game
 

I've heard that there were problems with the infrared reflecting off the diamond plate. Might be an unseen problem by FIRST.

Re: Infared in Next Year's Game
 

Well, we know this much at least. Autonomous is here to stay. Which is fine. However, if the game is ever made entirely autonomous, with no drivers, I think that would take a LOT of the excitement out of the game. I hope that never happens. There has to be a human brain or four on the other side doing something.

Also, it seems that Dave WANTS IR to be mandatory. Which I don't think is a bad thing. Also, we can guess that next year, there will be some sort of non-stationary, or non-predictable element in autonomous, thus maing some sort of tracking system (like IR) necessary for all teams.

And if that's the case, IR won't be mandatory, but it will probably be the best solution.

Re: Infared in Next Year's Game
 

Alrighty, here's my thought which seems like no one else has mentioned here, so this may hurt your brain a tad bit.

Imagine a "scoring object" that is wired up wtih an IR beacon emitting different codes. THere will be multiple "scoring objects" on the field at any given time, with different codes assigned to each one. Only certain codes will be worth points. SO let's say that "scoring object 1" has a 101 code while "scoring object 2" has a 110 code. Visually, you'd never be able to interpret which "scoring object" is which. BUT, using LED feedback on the driver's interface (wow, forcing drivers to use feedback, interesting...), and IR sensors on the robot, drivers could figure out which "scoring objects" were worth points.

Whaddyall think? I think it'd be really fun, and leave that extra bit of excitment in the crowd as they wouldnt know who won the match until the "Scoring object" codes were revealed.

Re: Infared in Next Year's Game
 

That was the partial intent on my post about dave's other hint thread:

http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...746#post232746

Re: Infared in Next Year's Game
 

IR is here to stay. Notice FIRST's pattern: bring in something new and make it easy, then make it harder. They did the same thing with alliances. THe first year it wasn't so bad. Then it got harder. Same thing with last year - no set requirements for autonomous. All you had to do was either go straight forward or do a 180-degree arc. This year, you had to find a 12" ball on the side of the field by going through a relatively narrow space and hit the ball off of a T surrounded on 3 sides (left, right, and top) by walls, as well as placing an opponent ball next to it so almost any inaccuracy would favor the opponent. I reckon (pardon the pun...heh) that they will do a similar thing with IR. THis year it was not necessary. There were other ways. Next year, I'm betting it will be a bigger part of the game, possibly even required. Like autonomous last year was not required. This year, you were penalized for not using it. Look for IR to become a bigger part of the game. I just hope they don't use jimmy's scenario (post#27)

Re: Infared in Next Year's Game
 

I say that because from what i have seen so far, FIRST does what it can to mimic real life engineering situations, and in general, aribtirary rules are not placed on problems like "you must use this approach to solve it". The one plausible idea is something like the one suggested before that FIRST might put IR beacons on objects that are otherwise unidentifiable, but personally, i think this is unlikely for the same reason i stated before.

Re: Infared in Next Year's Game
 

Well geez, arbitrary rules placed on problems is a staple of mathematics! (I say this just getting home from a Linear Algebra class ... so forgive me if my mind is on math, but I just got through solving one such arbitrary problem.)

And, if you think about it, engineering too ... the rules aren't too "arbitrary," though, so long as they make you learn something new and delve into unfamiliar territory (a good thing). E.g., we're limited to 130 lbs., we must only use certain motors and in certain quantities ... etc. These are called constraints -- and mathematics, as well as engineering is full of them! Using IR sensors could very well just be another constraint.

Re: Infared in Next Year's Game
 

Fair enough. I dont think there should be no constraints, but the other constraints are a little more realistic in my opinion. They seem more like real ones, and they often have practical reasons in our case, they dont just mimic practical constraints :) Like the weight limit is what two students can probably carry and the size limit is less than a wide door. I guess its mostly my opinion as i can't put it into words, but i think that forcing the use of a sensor is unrealistic.

Re: Infared in Next Year's Game
 

they force us to use:
the RC system
the battery
the main breaker
the smaller breakers
the C programming language
the OI
the same motors
the RF link
......

if they somehow forced us to use the IR sensors and beacons next year to play the game, its nothing they havent been doing for years.

Re: Infared in Next Year's Game
 

pracitcal reasons for everything on the list, safety, money, fairness.......... maybe there is one you can use to argue for the IR sensors, fairness....

Re: Infared in Next Year's Game
 

yes, the object of the game

this year the object of the game was to hit or pickup small balls, place large balls ,and hang on a bar

they could easily make the object of the game be to find an object that is emitting an IR signal - maybe only a few out of many emit the IR

its would be an interesting challenge because IR is invisable to humans, so you could not fall back on having your driver make the selection based on what he sees on the field

I think it would be fun.

Re: Infared in Next Year's Game
 

I agree with you completely. Though it would make the game a little more interesting to have an element of IR or something of the sort required, it's just not in the FIRST spirit to make it mandatory that you do things a certain way, is it? I=Inspiration (or improvisation, depending on who you ask), and you don't get inspiration from someone telling you what you must use on your creation. Right?

Re: Infared in Next Year's Game
 

I think it would add a completely new dimension to the game.

I would love to have objects that are IR-tagged and invisible to the driver between the right objects and wrong objects. The only problem I see is it could make the game extremely boring to an audience. Did they score or not? So I don't see that happening unless they have some way for the audience to know the right ones (think about tv game shows where the tv audience can see the price and they are yelling at the moron on tv who isn't even close.....I watch too much Price is Right..lol.) Now that could be cool but I don't see how it would work.

The one thing FIRST would have to do is offer multiple scoring options (non-ir) or have code and general instructions to get IR working and have it finished before kickoff so their IRbots can battle it out to show us the game. No more volunteers on bikes or ditching non working robots to have the humans play. If FIRST can't get it right how could they expect the teams to.

Re: Infared in Next Year's Game
 

they could play in total darkness, and give everyone in the audience night vision goggles :^)

Re: Infared in Next Year's Game
 

Yes but I don't know if I trust the live audience. There would be a lot of signaling to teams. Or at least yelling out, "yes" "no" "left" "right". I guess it could be like the price is right except the audience knows the answer.

Re: Infared in Next Year's Game
 

I guarentee you this will not be the case since it is fairly easy to see infared using a camera. They would have to randomly change the feild every single time or else there is no challenge.

Re: Infared in Next Year's Game
 

and you think the driver would be able to hear any of that?!

have you ever actully BEEN to a regional? :^)

Re: Infared in Next Year's Game
 

I dont understand your reasoning? the drivers would not be allowed to use a camera to scan the field, or anything else

Re: Infared in Next Year's Game
 

They wouldn't hear. But people would still try. And after the match was finished and the driver made a mistake they would come up and say "What were you doing, didn't you hear me."

I was more referring to signals such as people with huge signs. You could make a really cool LED one that you could push a button to light up the words. Now that would be awesome. If you ever saw 34's light up LED rockets you could see what I mean.

Re: Infared in Next Year's Game
 

or you could hook an IR sensor to a servo on your bot, and have the bot scan the field with about 3 lines of code - much easier than building an LED alphanumeric display panel :^)

Re: Infared in Next Year's Game
 

Boy oh boy, at the regionals I attended, a LOT of people were VERY ticked off about the way IR was implemented this year, and were simply reprogramming their robots to run without their IR sensors...

The biggest challenge I see is the mere fact that we have two competing forces at play:
1) The desire for the arena to "look flashy" for the TV CAMERAS, and
2) The arena be "Robot IR Vision Friendly".

The choice of shiny diamond plate on everything was nice for the cameras, but caused a LOT of teams' hardware to see IR beacons everywhere. They were grumbling about the Kickoff's "solemn promise that we'd have reflections dampened", and people swearing they'd NEVER be suckered into working on something like this again if there was ANY simpler way to do it. <sigh>

Yes, some had designs that via one method or another you could ignore or filter out reflections. Most simply preaimed their scanners toward the primary emitter of interest at round start, or ignored things until their robot was CLOSE via ded reckoning. But what's the fun in that? You shouldn't HAVE to do such things.

Note also that you still didn't NEED IR this year, nor line following. In fact, many people using ANY "binary" sensor based steering system (e.g. primitive narrow focus line followers that said "go left, go right") quickly found themselves driving very slowly to hold the line or path without oscillating, and were beaten to the tee by a good ol' ded reckoner almost every time... NOT the kind of negative feedback you want to give people TRYING to use the advanced method!

I feel that as long as FIRST definitively specs object locations on the field, autonomous time is so short, and the given sensor/cpu combo is crude, there's no NEED to risk ANY sensor based approach beyond ded reckoning. You're just "asking to get your bot kicked"... ;) And honestly, that's too bad. I'd LOVE to see some serious sensor based activity in this game! (Don't mind me... Among other things, by trade I'm also an Instrumentation Engineer... :D )

IMO, What FIRST needs to do is spec a "random position object" or otherwise TAGGED item in their game specs. IMHO, it shouldn't be the WHOLE game, but a BONUS.

My advice to make IR (or optical systems) more important:

1) KILL the IR reflections on the field! Either get rid of shiny diamond plate, locate the beacons where the robot CAN'T see it, or find a method, coating, or material that makes things nice and shiny in visible light for the cameras, but "flat/absorbing" in IR. That would be VERY helpful.

2) Consider placing redundant beacons or corner cube retroreflectors around (or on the corners of) the field, as navigational "landmarks". I say redundant, because robots and objects will always occlude SOME beacons. Color filtered retroreflectors could make great landmarks, as long as you provide emitters, detectors, and/or the corresponding color filters (or software) in the kit to place in front of the optical detectors to differentiate them.

3) Include a marked, yet randomized object as a field device. Give extra credit to those that ID, find, or manipulate it CORRECTLY.

One example: "Find The Beacon(s)". When you see an object in front of you, do something like push a bar on it to raise a flag for points, shine YOUR color of light over its well to change ITS color so you "CLAIM IT", or move it into the CORRECT basket. Deduct a LOT for "guessing wrong". Leave traps so blind random attempts to tag EVERYTHING takes points AWAY from your alliance.

Another example from this game might be to have a polygonal sided rolling goal with multiple vertical posts around its perimeter. One of them, and its opposite mate, are marked with a beacon (or is shiny, vs flat black). The goal is again placed with one edge against some stop, in a randomized fashion. This gives each side a shot at a "valuable" post. Grab and manipulate it by the "valuable" post and you get more points than if you grab any other. This also allows SOME chance that by sheer dumb luck you can gain points if your scanner fails, but rewards those that "do the work" more consistently. :D (Field attendants roll a multisided die, and set the orientation AFTER you are ready, robot turned on but disabled, and all players waiting for round start in the player's box, with their hands off their controls. This prevents "signaling" the robot's auto mode code with "the right answer" of several options via a button press.)

A third example: Instead of COLLECTING, for once make a "DISPENSER". (Perhaps even be given a preloaded dispenser to snap onto your robot??) You now run around flagging beacon marked randomizable objects by attaching them to the object (maybe snap a detachable carabiner onto a ring or bar by the beacon?), or running back and forth between two rows of baskets, placing YOUR color of ball into the basket whose beacon is turned on THIS time.

4) Make a SLOW, RANDOMLY MOVING object, that's beacon marked, such as a slow turtle, that's patrolling a short line, circle, or figure 8 of tape. Find it, touch it, grab it, or tag it with a flag, and you get points. (A favorite object of mine is a "Santa Ball", those crazy running motorized balls that go careening off of walls... Add beacons to them and let a few loose as the Bonus Balls!)

5) Make a spinable turntable that you have to interact with (like in Toroid Terror") or a vertical "carnival wheel" whose ORIENTATION is indicated via a beacon or a corner cube on its perimeter. Lock it so it can't simply be spun by the robots. That orientation beacon/marker tells you where to go to access it.


There are a LOT of possible variations here. The common thread is always use the marker to indicate something on the field that is otherwise UNKNOWN, at least at the time autonomous mode is started.

- Keith

Re: Infared in Next Year's Game
 

This is VERY cool stuff... (and similar to a project I was once involved in...)

For another technique, see the ham APRS project (http://aprs.org)

Too bad APRS uses GPS, which is unusable in this context. (Indoors, too small an area, etc.) However the IDEA of smart packet transcevers exchanging position info (used by both systems) is VERY interesting, and could be exploited by IFI. Think about it. We already HAVE a packet modem system with the eWave modems, so something may be able to be done at the ARENA level, to inject information into the loop. There may be some way to combine these technologies.

Unfortunately, making TOO smart of an arena (e.g. having the ARENA calculate our position from our robot's eWave transmission with lots of arena hardware, and sending the position data back TO us) is probably NOT a good idea. You'd have to include "arena simulation parts" in the kit for testing, and you REALLY don't want the kits any more expensive than they are now. Too many teams (esp rookies) have enough trouble just getting their ROBOT work in the six weeks, let alone making more. :D

The only way I'd see a Smart Arena Game be feasable is if:

(A) The EduBot CPU could emulate the ENTIRE arena's contribution with VERY simple additional hardware (just like this year with the beacons), or

(B) A simple and cheap PIC project (preprogrammed PIC and PCB) be included in the kit that does the "smart arena" thing for you, similar to the "current sensor project".

BTW, speaking of PICs... One of our mentors whipped up a dual beacon waveform generator on a tiny "couple of buck PIC" to free up the EduBot CPU. Code was REALLY dirty, but it WAS done quickly with one of the freebie PIC C compilers. It acted as one beacon, with a slave LED/Transistor board for the other. Worked well, but we never used it because we dropped whole the beacon navigation approach.

However, it only took a couple of days to whip up, and (other than the PCB) cost < $10 in parts, so it was a GREAT Proof of Concept for (B) above... If we ever get out from under our OTHER projects, we may consider writing it up for the whitepaper area sometime this summer.

- Keith