Photorealistic, Reliable 3D Mapping For Robots 33
An Anonymous Coward writes: "Hans Moravec at Carnegie Mellon University has updated his DARPA-funded MARS program page
, including new info about the possibily of having photo-realistic 3D mapping for robots in the near future. "Our machines will navigate employing a dense 3D awareness of their surroundings, be tolerant of route surprises, and be easily placed by ordinary workers in entirely new routes or work areas. The long-elusive combination of easy installation and reliability should greatly expand cost-effective niches for mobile robots, and make possible a growing market that can itself sustain further development...We expect our new data to bring us further towards photorealism, and more importantly extremely reliable 3D maps." Check out all the slides and movies at the bottom of the page."
CounterStrike in my City. (Score:1)
It would also be great for all other sorts of simulations when the actual place couldn't be visited.
Interesting (Score:2)
Lego my robo... (Score:1)
Neat stuff...
Computer Vision's Goal (Score:5)
HOWEVER, its still a long time coming. In addition, space projects and industry require much more precision and accuracy than academia can offer alone. Keep in mind that CMU already did the "No hands across America" project, where there cars "drove" (they controlled breaks and gas) 99% of the way across the United States autonomously. That was a while ago - so was their total virtual environment mapping dome. Have you seen any autonomous cars for sale? What about 3d videos that you can see from every point of view?
We still have a long way to go.
I saw something similair to this at MIT (Score:3)
Re:Is the program Open Source? (Score:2)
MIT is doing something similar (Score:3)
Very interesting
Classic example of SMPA (Score:5)
You can read some superficial information about all of these guys (and others) in the book Robo sapiens.
A review of Robo sapiens can be found here [popbeads.org].
Re:Map this! (Score:1)
L. Ron has some strong ganja!
Re:Computer Vision's Goal (Score:1)
> 3d videos that you can see from every point of view
Maybe not, but I heard there were some hot and heavy DVD's with this little feature.
Not that I'd know or anything..
Re:Classic example of SMPA (Score:2)
Brooks never managed to get his beaviour based approach to higher levels than simply evading objects. If you read his (older) papers, you can understand why
So
One question... (Score:3)
Ok, my only question... have they used it for porn yet? (they always seem to use technology first
Other posts you are likely to see:
1. I want a 3D map of Natalie Portman!
2. Can they make a beowulf of these?
3. Im gonna pour hot grits on the robot!
Ok, I just needed to get that out of my system.
Mark Duell
Re:OT: No hands across America (Score:1)
Re:MIT is doing something similar (Score:2)
Robots with AI (Score:2)
The positive side to this is that this is a necessary prerequisite for things like the robots from the Jetsons.
Image for the future: the Microsoft OS for Robots. Now why does this produce the reaction I an sure it produces? and why does it make me nervous?
Slashdot rejected this (Score:1)
- A.P. (-1, offtopic, I know.)
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* CmdrTaco is an idiot.
Re:Classic example of SMPA (Score:2)
Re:Classic example of SMPA (Score:3)
No it isn't. It's just a vision processing system that creates an internal model of the 3d environment around it. Once you build that model, you can do whatever type of reactive behavior or goal-oriented planning you wish.
movie effects (Score:1)
Re:MIT is doing something similar (Score:2)
Microsoft already did this! (Score:2)
we call 'em "MCSEs"
Re:Classic example of SMPA (Score:3)
Early thinking (60s-70s) really was to build a detailed model of the world, grind it down to simple primitives, and run a logic-based planner on it. That had a terrible time dealing with uncertainty and required a very regular world.
Moravec introduced the idea of "certainty grids", which are probablistic occupancy maps. Originally, he used this as a means of getting useful data from ultrasonic rangefinders, which are very low resolution devices with slow data rates. (I've built a robot that works that way myself, and you really can get maps with more resolution than the sonar beam by taking enough samples as the robot moves.) As enough compute power became available, he moved to laser rangefinders (better resolution, but clunky rotating mirrors) and finally to passive stereo imaging.
What you get out of systems like this is a map of the neighborhood showing what's open space and what isn't. This is a good input to a repulsive-field type path planner. There's no need to extract a "primal sketch" or do any object recognition just to accomplish navigation using this approach. It works quite well; the CMU Navlab vehicles have been cruising around offroad on this technology for years now. The Denning guard robots used this technology with sonars.
Extracting range data from stereo imagery was Moravec's thesis topic in the 1960s. It took a mainframe computer 20 minutes per frame back then. Now it can be done in real time. There's commercial software [ptgrey.com] for this. Two cameras are good; three cameras are better. It's actually not that hard; it's basically done by convolution. It's not done by edge recognition any more. Convolution is computationally expensive, but simple. We finally have enough compute power to do this stuff.
I've commented on Brooks' work previously, so I won't say any more about that now.
Re:OT: No hands across America (Score:1)
Hans Moravec (Score:2)
if i recall correctly, in 100 years (or was it 50?) he claims robots will operate fully autonomously, and act more or less as intelligently as a standard-issue human being. in a little longer, he expects robots will inherit the earth, the stock sci-fi drama of robots being superior to us in every aspect, rationally, physiologically, even creatively/emotionally, and we either make ourselves cyborgs/robots, or the robots proper become the mightiest animal in the urban jungle.
so... maybe the proverbial grain of salt is in order, but of course it's wonderful to see this kind of vast technological progress.
Problem with Brook's work... (Score:3)
I am currently a graduating senior in both biology and computer science, and am very interested in the integration of both, in the areas of neuroethology and biomimetics. Most of the people doing biomimetic robotics (i.e. robots quite strictly based on biological systems, theories, data, and constraints) don't like Brooks for that reason. He created robots, vaguely insect like - they used no real biomechanical data, neural control data, etc., and seemed to suggest that there was some real insect structural and behavioral aspects to them. I also think he's somewhat of a playboy, going from so-called "insect-like" robots (Genghis, Attila, etc.) to his media/attention/funding grabbing monstrosity COG (not that I think $$$ going to AI research is bad in any way), which he makes claims with hubristic abandon about its learning abilities.
I bet in a few years, when interest and funding dies, and he sees what a complex, deep hole he's dug himself into, he'll think of something new to grab headlines about...
BTW for those really interested in more "hard" work on biologically inspired control and networks, look at Eve Marder's page at Brandeis (which I don't have with me at the moment) and have a nice gander at
http://neuromechanics.cwru.edu
The Case Western Reserve University's new graduate program in neuro-mechanical systems. There, Dr. Roger Quinn, and many other researcher are working on some great biomemetic projects, including a robo-roach, and cricket. They use hard biological data to design these guys with. They also do significant work in neural basis of behavior, biomechanics, and neural-controlled prosthetics. I'm also plugging it because there is a 50-50 chance I will be attending the PhD program there next year in sunny, gorgeous Cleveland, OH!
Sincerely,
Kevin Christie
kwchri@wm.edu
Re:CounterStrike in my City. (Score:1)
Er... Well, y'know. You can't make an omelette without um... destroying a forest. Or something.
Re:CounterStrike in my City. (Score:2)
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What's next (Score:2)
Most of the stuff you see is data collected several years ago. The office scenes are from 1996.
Gimme a moment to set up a URL.. I'll spit out a binary and a datafile so you can navigate the room yourself. See the result of the program, in all it's brokenness and accuracy.
Current status: (which was interrupted recently due to making the report)
He's about to collect a new dataset with a trinocular vision system, and redo the code to build the occupancy grids. The new dataset should have fewer errors and 'streak' artifacts. (There are subte reasons why it's screwing up on that dataset) His code should be able to build a new occupancy grid every few seconds.
The next stage should include putting it in a real robot. (Which I've seen.. It's a cute, its wheels look like saw blades.) building maps automatically. The eventual target is an external 'head' that can be bolted onto any robot.
(One thing I should finish before he gets back is a new viewer for the occupancy grids. So I can get a 'birds eye idea' of what they look like.. Eyeball them for myself before building code that will be playing with them.)
Too bad I'm a CS Theory weenie instead of robotics.. But it will be one hell of a cool next year.
PS: Tip for everyone... Dumb luck strikes, but you have to make your own luck and grab it when you get it. I met Hans only a couple of months ago. Hans was walking out one day. (By the newly key-carded doors). I was talking to him and asked if he thought the CMU administration were malicious, he said he thought they were inept. I asked what his research was, and it went from there.
Re:Slashdot rejected this (Score:2)
Worldcom [worldcom.com] - Generation Duh!
Re:What's next (Score:1)
Re:What's next (Score:1)
Re:CounterStrike in my City. (Score:2)
THEN things will get interesting. . .
(think, the spinning bots will have a 360-degree field of vision, each frame updated once per revolution. . . better drivers, theoretically faster reaction time.. .
Re:What's next (Score:1)