If you didn’t watch this tonight on PBS, watch for reruns. You can also see it on the PBS Website at http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/darpa/. It would make a great video for a preseason meeting.
It was great. We commented several times about “type-FIRST” personalities. (You know, like a Type-A, but geekier 
)
Loved the show. The only difference between those guys and us is that they’re on the next level (with a bit more creative liscense). Wouldn’t be surprised to see something from their challenge in FIRST before 2010.
I was struck by how much they all looked and sounded like FIRST mentors (or slightly older FIRST students).
The Seattle Robotics Society sponsors Robo-Magellan at its Robothon event every fall. It’s a lot like “The Great Robot Race” on a budget: http://www.robothon.org/robothon/challenge.php. We had a nice chat with last year’s winner, who is the one who told us that the CMU camera is prone to UV-overload in bright environments, like outdoors.
I am part of Mini DARPA which takes place in Penn State Abington. For Mini DARPA it is really on a total different level than FIRST. This makes FIRST building season a walk in the park. So far I have my own autonomous vehicle. Its much smaller than a real car but works the same. It is off a fisherprice car with its 4 motors hooked up on a solid duel axel frame run off a PWMs. The hard part is the programming. I use a Parallax Stamp board to program. For the navigation part, I use GPS to navigate coordinates and when GPS looses signal the program uses a electromagnetic compass to navigate the same direction untill GPS is found again. In addition I use a ultrasonic Ping(( Sensor on a scanning Servo to dodge objects in its path. This is a little run down of my autonomous vehicle. Of course there is more but you guys get the idea. Its more porgramming then mechnical work. Hope this helps to help you guys understand this DARPA compeiton.
I actually saw that last night. It was a good program. When my team (931) conducted our Fall training camp for local teams, we had somebody from the “red team”(highlander & sandstorm) come in and do a presentation. It was really cool. Last year we had the “X-Prize” winners come in and talk.
This was an awesome show I’m going to recommend it to my team to watch as well.
Ellery
http://www.mininova.org/tor/266446 for those that missed it here’s the torrent :]
Does anybody have it on dvd?
Also for the teams who own a projector, did you buy one or did you get it donated?
Please support PBS buy purchasing one of their NOVA DVD’s. Unfortunately, the federal government is drastically cutting their budget, and if it were not for viewer contributions (as in DVD purchases), then they would not be able to produce wonderful documentaries like this. The DVD is only $19.95.
Here’s this link: NOVA | The Great Robot Race | Order this Program | PBS
(If I sound like I’m plugging for PBS, sorry. I really appreciate their NOVA programs and I’m not very happy at the government for cutting the National Science Foundation budget, despite the President’s State of the Union speech that stated that science is important for our future. :()