8 ms·
Self-flying drone dips, darts and dives through trees at 30 mph
- rrggrr 11y agoIm reminded of the movie Real Genius. This is most applicable as an autonomous weapon. Unavoidable and its going to suck.
- carb 11y agoThe video is too stylized for me. I would love for a more steady camera showcasing the drone avoiding obstacles as it flies around. The jump-cuts and music detract from the cool tech I want to learn about.
- agumonkey 11y agoSome lo tech drone filming from afar would have been so much better. I can understand the excitement translating in the filming style but come on.
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- nkozyra 11y agoI just don't understand asking a human to run the camera drone. Presumably there's more than one of these, have one follow and rely on the pace drone for positioning. It was pretty hard to watch, but really watching sensing and localization applied in a 3D space is extremely cool.
- paulftw 11y agomaybe a camera drone would see the one in front as an obstacle and constantly try to turn away from it :)
- kevinchen 11y agoTo do that reliably, I think both vehicles would need to know their absolute positions with high resolution (spatial and time). Could be a separate research project given how small their planes are.
- Scarblac 11y agoMany of the fragments in the video would be a lot more interesting if they lasted longer than a second. This is edited to seem exciting, not to show what the actual capabilities and limitations are.
- GPGPU 11y agoHey, birds manage do to this without LIDAR and Kinnect so you know it was theoretically possible.
- agumonkey 11y ago> Barry’s realization was that, at the fast speeds ... the world simply does not change much ... So is c the speed where nothing changes ? cold.
- kepano 11y agoI guess I was expecting something more like this goshawk flying through a forest, but maybe it's too much to ask for :) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p-_RHRAzUHM&start=100 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p-_RHRAzUHM&start=100
- keville 11y agoNice link. Makes you wonder what biomimicry might bring to drones in a couple of generations. Maybe in addition to a set of propeller motors, you could have a couple of servos running small deployable "fan-like fins" (or is that fin-like fans?) for fast maneuvering where just changing prop speed won't quite cut it.
- nkurz 11y agoKiwi birds too: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sdUUx5FdySs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sdUUx5FdySs (Caution: On topic, but saddest short animation ever made)
- ggambetta 11y agoI would describe that as "Drone dodges, ducks, dips, dives and... dodges".
- jonyt 11y agoFancy camera work, but the obstacle avoidance is not convincing. The drone basically passes by one tree, and that's mostly it. Compare that to any bird that lives its life in the brush. Human built flying machines are fast and can carry huge loads but compared to animals we still lag far behind in control and finesse.
- ratsimihah 11y agoSo does the brain and AI. What, I'm off topic?
- mmanfrin 11y agoCompare to humans: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1MBW8zoZUR4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1MBW8zoZUR4
- gherkin0 11y agoThat's a little misleading: the video has a "do you want to see the crashes" link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QgrvrD_GOvg&feature=iv&src_vid=1MBW8zoZUR4&annotation_id=annotation_103248233 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QgrvrD_GOvg&feature=iv&src_v...
- the8472 11y agoI'm sure the autonomous drone had a bunch of crashes too. Flying with VR must be quite amazing anyway.
- Strilanc 11y agoIs... is the video intended to be a parody of something? It's like they took two shots of a drone turning slightly to avoid a tree in the middle of a field, and decided to hit it with a nuclear bomb of "MAKE IT FEEL MORE EPIC" in editing.
- eljimmy 11y agoYeah... I was expecting a drone to be weaving through a forest of trees. Not flying towards a single tree and maneuvering around it. Still cool, but that music and editing was over the top.
- AustinBGibbons 11y agoThe insight into only needing the differentials in the next 10 meters makes a load of sense and clearly worked. Why is everyone hating on the video? I thought it was light-hearted and fun.
- justifier 11y agoyeah, only i wished the insight would have been an algo that determines the necessary distance based on the drone's speed
- dogma1138 11y agoThe Navy really wants to get rid of pilots as it seems.
- kzhahou 11y agoThis does go a long way to explaining speeder bikes -- the human rider controls the gross movement, but the bike itself does obstacle avoidance. Otherwise, there's no way a regular stormtrooper could fly those through the thick forests of Endor.
- redblacktree 11y agoI like this theory! I think this[0] may be evidence to the contrary though. It looks like the driver crashes due to inattention. [0]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4wSG3m4VNlo&t=2m8s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4wSG3m4VNlo&t=2m8s
- Houshalter 11y agoIn video games, there are a lot of clever tricks they use to make the player more likely to hit enemies. E.g. the cursor slows down when you get close to an enemy, and bullets bend towards them. See this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UL1_ht1EdAU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UL1_ht1EdAU I wonder if tricks like these would work on real life vehicles.
- rasz_pl 11y ago>In video games in console games
- thecatspaw 11y agoconsole games are video games too
- Finbel 11y agoIsn't console games and video games equivalent expressions? As opposed to computer games? (that is: I agree with you)
- michaelmior 11y ago
- rasz_pl 11y agoin case you are wondering: http://groups.csail.mit.edu/robotics-center/public_papers/Barry15a.pdf http://groups.csail.mit.edu/robotics-center/public_papers/Ba... 20 watts, running on two ODROID-U3
- bigiain 11y agoNow I've got no idea where the $1,700 comes from - I was assuming it was ~$100 worth of typical rc flying wing, with $1500+ worth of cameras and computers on board...
- peteflorence 11y agoFor a comparison, check out Intel's video from earlier this year: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gj-5RNdUz3I https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gj-5RNdUz3I
- z2 11y agoThe way the trees glow white in the plane view at 1:09 -- could they be using near infrared cameras or filters to help specifically with tree detection? Nowhere in the color video do the leaves look that bright. The paper doesn't seem to mention it though. http://groups.csail.mit.edu/robotics-center/public_papers/Barry14a.pdf http://groups.csail.mit.edu/robotics-center/public_papers/Ba...
- teraflop 11y agoIt definitely looks like infrared to me. The paper mentions that they use a pair of Point Grey Firefly MV cameras, and the reference manual for those cameras[1] says that "in monochrome models, the IR filter is replaced with a transparent piece of glass." [1]: http://www.ptgrey.com/support/downloads/10116/ http://www.ptgrey.com/support/downloads/10116/
- imauld 11y agoI wish I could be more excited about this but the most probable use for this technology is making it easier for drones to spy on people or for cruise missiles to be able to better fly into someone's window. :-(
- jlebrech 11y agocould it patrol the city for crime?
- tianlin-shi 11y agoI wonder how well this generalizes to other environments, especially cities with dense blocks.
- fpvracing 11y agoVery impressive. I wonder if this is the beginning of the end of FPV racing as a sport? If you're unsure what FPV racing is, see http://fpvracing.tv http://fpvracing.tv
- teekert 11y agoThis is a very disappointing movie, it shows the drone dodging the same tree (or just branch actually) over an over again, there is no indication of its speed, it dodges only one obstacle every time before a cut/edit is done. Is there a reason this was not tried in a forest (as the title would suggest)?
- gloves 11y agoThe sad thing about this is as the technology advances, the likely first movers on this tech will be for military purposes. Do enjoy what appears to be VR piloting at 1.28 however. First great useage of it I have seen.
- MrBra 11y agoI instantly thought about Interstellar beginning scene...