Dual Cameras - Dual Purposes

[Invictus3593]

What I'd recommend making a simple ask/response protocol over TCP. When asked for it, take the IR or depth image on the robot and writing it. When it is read on the DB, format it as needed and transfer it into an image of some sort. I have some Kinect code in LV that moves the data efficiently into different formats if you find you need it.

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Using an accelerometer to determine distance is a very hard problem. To do this, you need to know orientation as well as accelerations and you need to have high quality sensors and/or knowledge of how the chassis can be affected.

If I used a gyro and the kinect sensor together and had a small diagram of the field and our robot on it (to scale of the field), couldn't I use the gyro for orientation? On the kinect side, I was thinking that maybe taking the accelerometer data and calculating speed and time to get the distance traveled, then compare that to the gyro data and move the diagramed robot accordingly.

It is very possible to show 3 camera feeds in c++( 2 from the kinect, 1 from a webcam), and c for the matter. I could send you a really good demo program that I wrote for our team meeting last week to teach our new programmers about openCV/computer vision. Pm me and I'll send it to you. It's kind of long (~100ish lines) so it'd really stretch out this post and would be obnoxious.

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Instead of using the accelerometer , we use a gyro for orientation. What we have been working on is using our vision solution instead of a gyro, or as a check for it at the very least. To do this for all 6 desired values, x y and z displacement, and pitch roll yaw, I'd suggest using pose. I digress, however. I would love to work on a project like this with anyone interested (that is, using the accelerometer readings in the kinect)

I have some experience with opencv, but i used the .net wrapper to use it in c# and i felt like it lacked what i needed. But i'd love to see that code! I'll be pm-ing you soon.

does the gyro provide speed and time? I have never used one so I have no idea. If it does, there may be no reason to call the kinect's accelerometer at all, just use the gyro to help plot the diagram maybe?

[faust1706]

Originally Posted by Invictus3593

If I used a gyro and the kinect sensor together and had a small diagram of the field and our robot on it (to scale of the field), couldn't I use the gyro for orientation? On the kinect side, I was thinking that maybe taking the accelerometer data and calculating speed and time to get the distance traveled, then compare that to the gyro data and move the diagramed robot accordingly.

does the gyro provide speed and time? I have never used one so I have no idea. If it does, there may be no reason to call the kinect's accelerometer at all, just use the gyro to help plot the diagram maybe?

If you aren't knowledgeable with calculus, to get position out of acceleration, you have to integrate the graph of the values twice, but that won't be too hard considering how powerful of machines laptops. If you do this for x, y and z, you get orientation in relation to your starting position. A problem we have with our gyro is that it drifts, so it starts climbing at an exponential rate. i have a vivid memory of our gyro climbing at 10 rps (revolutions per SECOND) while testing our motors in the pit to make sure everything was running smoothly. While the gyro climbing isn't the worst thing in the world, it is when you use the gyro for machanuum (spelling?) wheels. I haven't heard of many teams having this problem, but we have it, so it affects what we do. The gyro we have just gives pitch roll and yaw based off our initial orientation, which helps us for machanuum driving but nothing else.

I really like the idea of using the accerlometer in the kinect, it's already there, so why not use it, right?

[Invictus3593]

Originally Posted by faust1706

If you aren't knowledgeable with calculus, to get position out of acceleration, you have to integrate the graph of the values twice, but that won't be too hard considering how powerful of machines laptops. If you do this for x, y and z, you get orientation in relation to your starting position.

In my physics class, we're learning that kind of stuff, so technically it would be just a matter of inputting variables into the correct equations to get time and speed and position, i thought.

Originally Posted by faust1706

...I really like the idea of using the accerlometer in the kinect, it's already there, so why not use it, right?

I agree! If the accelerometer is sensitive enough, it would be ideal for this. I think it's a matter of getting the right data, though.

Also, i shot you an email because it wouldn't let me PM you, faust.


I'll start a new thread pertaining to the position idea here in a few so we stay on the camera idea in this thread!

[adciv]

See this other post for some code. The code isn't as neat as I would like, but If I remember right, I had it feeding the image to the driverstation. Short version, I compressed the image to JPG, sent it over TCP to the driver station, and decoded it for display on the screen.

http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh....php?p=1205226

[Invictus3593]

Originally Posted by adciv

See this other post for some code. The code isn't as neat as I would like, but If I remember right, I had it feeding the image to the driverstation. Short version, I compressed the image to JPG, sent it over TCP to the driver station, and decoded it for display on the screen.

http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh....php?p=1205226

Is there a PC port for this program? I'm not a fluent Linux user, haha. If not, would it be relatively simple for me to rebuild the same program to a PC executable?

[Invictus3593]

I got the C# program written to get the Kinect depth picture, now i can't figure out how to send the data over tcp to the dashboard, any ideas?