Linux Robot with Omnidirectional Vision

Described here is an integrated miniaturised robot with an omnidirectional visual sensor. The hardware consists of a Gumstix computer and an image sensor mounted on a small fast autonomous mobile robot. An experiment follows which demonstrates that a simple omnidirectional vision method produces reliable wall avoiding behaviour in the robot. This work is part of an on-going research project to explore visual guidance of small robots. The results presented here involve a catadioptric system using a low-resolution camera and a spherical mirror. Visual guidance of the robot is currently similar to that of a Braitenberg Vehicle. The robot moves freely within a designated area marked by a brighter floor covering. In the next stage of the project, a higher resolution camera will be used with a conical shaped mirror and more complex vision algorithms. Use will be made of biologically inspired optic flow techniques to achieve real-time obstacle avoidance.