2009 Control System Feature Wishlist

[Greg McKaskle]

If the goal of multiple cameras is to have a view in multiple directions, a single camera can do this with a mirror and some math. Point the camera straight up. Mount a curved mirror -- a hyperbolic is best, but simple mirrored Christmas balls can work. The image from the camera contains information from all around the camera, but it is distorted due to the shape of the ball. A math transform lets you put the pixels onto a cylinder, letting a single camera see everything around it.

Not the same as stereo-optic vision, but much simpler, and perhaps useful on a crowded field of robots.

Greg McKaskle