Senior Design Project: A Robotic System Using Stereoscopic Cameras For Navigation

This paper describes a senior design project involving eight undergraduates split into two teams: (1) a computer vision based navigational control team and (2) a robot vehicle design team. Each team was tasked with a specific goal relative to completing the project. The computer vision team’s goal was to develop an embedded stereoscopic vision system that will observe the scene around the robot and automatically provide navigational controls to the vehicle. The robot vehicle design team’s goal was to develop a robotic system capable of navigating coarse terrain given a sequence of navigation of commands. Each team had to accomplish a series of intermediate tasks in the process of their design. For the computer vision design team, intermediate design tasks included examination of real-time operating systems (RTOS), sensor selection, and algorithm development. Specific educational outcomes of the computer vision aspects of the design project included (1) understanding the theoretical models of camera image formation, (2) developing models for 3D surface geometry necessary to implement a stereo reconstruction system, (3) software implementation of digital camera Linux drivers, (4) algorithmic time and space requirements for stereoscopic reconstruction algorithms and (5) power-sensitive design for embedded digital signal processing systems. For the robotic vehicle design team, the primary tasks included building the mechanical part of the vehicle, adding sensors and computing hardware, and developing movement algorithms. Specific educational outcomes of the vehicle design aspects of the project included (1) understanding pulse width modulated (PWM) motor controllers, (2) power considerations in mobile computing designs, (3) Linux device driver programming, and (4) RS232 hardware communications design. This paper describes the experiences of the split-team project, including successes and failures. Also included are recommendations to senior design faculty on how to organize and mentor such projects.