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Real-Time 3D Stereo Tracking and Localizing of Spherical Objects with the iCub Robotic Platform

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Abstract

Visual pattern recognition is a basic capability of many species in nature. The skill of visually recognizing and distinguishing different objects in the surrounding environment gives rise to the development of sensory-motor maps in the brain, with the consequent capability of object reaching and manipulation. This paper presents the implementation of a real-time tracking algorithm for following and evaluating the 3D position of a generic spatial object. The key issue of our approach is the development of a new algorithm for pattern recognition in machine vision, the Least Constrained Square-Fitting of Ellipses (LCSE), which improves the state of the art ellipse fitting procedures. It is a robust and direct method for the least-square fitting of ellipses to scattered data. In this work we applied it to the iCub humanoid robotics platform simulator and real robot. We used it as a base for a circular object localization within the 3D surrounding space. We compared its performance with the Hough Transform and the state of the art ellipse fitting algorithms, in terms of robustness (succes/failure in the object detection) and fitting precision. Our experiments involve robustness against noise, occlusion, and computational complexities analyses.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. ARTS Lab—Scuola Superiore S.Anna, Polo S.Anna Valdera, Viale R. Piaggio, 34-56025, Pontedera, Italy

    Nicola Greggio & Cecilia Laschi

  2. Instituto de Sistemas e Robótica, Instituto Superior Técnico, 1049-001, Lisboa, Portugal

    Nicola Greggio, Alexandre Bernardino & José Santos-Victor

  3. ARTS & CRIM Lab—Scuola Superiore S.Anna, Polo S.Anna Valdera, Viale R. Piaggio, 34-56025, Pontedera, Italy

    Paolo Dario

Authors
  1. Nicola Greggio
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  2. Alexandre Bernardino
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  3. Cecilia Laschi
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  4. José Santos-Victor
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  5. Paolo Dario
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Correspondence to Nicola Greggio.

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Greggio, N., Bernardino, A., Laschi, C. et al. Real-Time 3D Stereo Tracking and Localizing of Spherical Objects with the iCub Robotic Platform. J Intell Robot Syst 63, 417–446 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10846-010-9527-3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10846-010-9527-3

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