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Visual Target Localization with the Spincopter

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Abstract

The goal of the Spincopter project was to design an energy efficient aircraft capable of autorotation glide that could be used for both indoor and outdoor surveillance. This paper demonstrates how to utilize the self-rotating capability of the Spincopter in order to acquire a 3D image of its environment and localize predefined object(s). The omnidirectional capabilities of such an UAV extends the otherwise very limited field of view of conventional cameras usually used for aerial photography and surveillance. The paper presents the theoretical background and the actual implementation of such a system. It presents the resulting images and offers a brief survey of the image quality.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computing, University of Zagreb, Unska 3, 10000, Zagreb, Croatia

    Tomislav Haus, Matko Orsag & Stjepan Bogdan

Authors
  1. Tomislav Haus
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  2. Matko Orsag
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  3. Stjepan Bogdan
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Correspondence to Tomislav Haus.

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Haus, T., Orsag, M. & Bogdan, S. Visual Target Localization with the Spincopter. J Intell Robot Syst 74, 45–57 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10846-013-9908-5

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10846-013-9908-5

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