Progress Report: 3/20/16

Progress:

• Figured out how to access the ar drone’s navdata (cardinal orientation and angles, velocity, altitude, etc.)
• Can read in this information and store it in local variables on the connected computer

Problems:

• Since I still haven’t tested out this new sensor data, I’m not sure how effective or accurate it will be
• My program, which should find the most likely path and align the drone along it, doesn’t return the correct result when multiple lines are detected on the floor

Plans:

• Test out the navdata and store all relevant information (for now, that’s mostly just the drone’s velocity and altitude)
• Use the velocity data to counter drifting
• Fix the program to return the correct path results when given multiple possibilities
• Incorporate a second color-thresholding method to find junctions, where the drone will stop and switch paths (a turn or fork in the path)

Progress Report: 3/13/16

News:

- Fixed up path detection on ground to find the best path within the blob that looks most like a line

Plans:
- Still need to fix the algorithm so I find the direction of that path (pick one of the two possible directions)
- Then have the drone align itself to the path direction
- Then test drone alignment by flying it over a tape line and having the drone align to the path

Progress Report: 3/6/16

We have decided to switch our strategy of autonomous flight by using the bottom camera and following a line on the floor. This was for the following reasons:

• The main camera couldn't detect markers that was further from a certain distance, which would eliminate the possibility of a marker at the end of hallways
• Following markers on the floor could possibly increase the accuracy of the flight
• Image processing could possibly be more accurate due to the fact it is just finding a line rather than a shape
• The drone will not fly as high, hopefully to increase the accuracy of the flight and line detection

We are now focused on switching the existing image processing to detect lines rather than a circle, and also thinking of different ways to deal with intersections and turning. So far, we are thinking that different colored circles will be used at the intersection and help to determine the direction the drone will turn to. This will be helpful once we implement flight paths to different rooms. Multi-color detection will also have to be utilized in order for this to be successful.

One problem that we have is that when detecting a line, the algorithm will highlight the border of the image for unknown reasons. Hopefully this isn't a significant issue and will be resolved soon.