How does your auto-aim work?

[Don Reid]

Our camera is bolted directly to the robot frame, no pan or tilt. It is in line with the cannon.
We mechanically align the camera to have the target at the center when the cannon shoots balls through the center of the goal from the desired position.

In use, when the driver requests it, the firmware uses a PID loop (sort of 2, for X & Y) to drive the robot until the center of the target is at the center of the camera.

We also have a custom dashboard program that shows the driver(s) where the camera sees the target. They use this to decide when to activate the auto method, or for manual aiming.