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Design, Implementation and Testing of a Vision System for Small Unmanned Vertical Take off and Landing Vehicles with Strict Payload Limitations

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Abstract

Alternative designs of a simple, low cost and effective vision system for small, portable, unmanned aerial vertical take off and landing (VTOL) vehicles are presented. Design configurations follow the ‘on-board’ and ‘on-the-ground’ processing concept and they depend on very strict payload limitations and power supply restrictions. Hardware and software components for both designs are described; advantages and disadvantages of both alternatives are compared; computational complexity is calculated and trade offs are discussed. Implementations on a series of small unmanned VTOL vehicles as well as testing details are included and experimental results are presented.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Computer Science and Engineering, Center for Robot Assisted Search and Rescue and Center for Urban Transportation Research, University of South Florida, Tampa, FL, USA

    M. Kontitsis, R. D. Garcia & K. P. Valavanis

Authors
  1. M. Kontitsis
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  2. R. D. Garcia
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  3. K. P. Valavanis
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Correspondence to K. P. Valavanis.

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Kontitsis, M., Garcia, R.D. & Valavanis, K.P. Design, Implementation and Testing of a Vision System for Small Unmanned Vertical Take off and Landing Vehicles with Strict Payload Limitations. J Intell Robot Syst 44, 139–159 (2005). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10846-005-9030-4

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10846-005-9030-4

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