An Exemplary Robot Soccer Vision System

FIRA robot soccer is strongly affected by the central vision system because of the head mounted camera. A single camera implies a central image processing system, which conflicts with the demands on autonomous acting of the individual robots. Even so this approach will continue to be used in the near future due to the limitations of the robot hardware. This paper presents a flexible and robust vision system for robot soccer. It is easy to use and to adapt and delivers stable results. The architecture of the system provides enough flexibility for different settings. For example, the use of two cameras for very large fields can be implemented comfortably and fast and requires only local changes in the code. The system is also prepared to allow the individual robot varying degrees of autonomy, even up to local vision in case the robot hardware is capable of this.