Most of my time this week was spent preparing for the proposal presentation, with some research in the CV system, as well as looking into parts we may want to order. We received some feedback from the presentation about the YOLOv4 tiny model that we planned to use, with a suggestion that we could try a more recent YOLO version, or even a different model entirely that is more accurate (ie. Faster R-CNN). Since YOLO is rather easy to set up, I am currently working on setting up YOLOv7 to try training on a custom dataset. Our order for a Jetson from the 18500 inventory has been approved, so hopefully I can try deploying YOLO on it soon. I have found multiple datasets of recyclable materials (ie. https://www.kaggle.com/datasets/alistairking/recyclable-and-household-waste-classification), so we have plenty of training data available.
I also looked into serial communication between the Arduino and Jetson. Both devices have serial communication pins that can be used to talk with each other. It is also possible to connect the two with a micro usb cable, which will likely be our approach. Communication between the two devices is an important part of meeting our project’s use case, so it’s good to see that this is possible and has been done before.
Mandy’s Status Report for 9/21
This week, I did research on the components that we are looking to purchase for our project. I double checked that the components we are looking into are able to fulfill our requirements and are compatible with each other. I also spent time researching the current state of recycling in America, to determine whether or not we should change the scope of our project. I also started working on the design proposal. I am on time with our schedule, with the design proposal still in progress. By next week, I hope to finish the design proposal, and send in requests for all of the materials that we need for our project.
Introduction and Project Summary
An important step in the recycling process is sorting items based on their material. Miscategorized materials can lead to recycling contamination, which can degrade materials, resulting in higher costs, and cause harm to employees responsible for sorting. Currently, places like Pittsburgh use single-stream recycling, where all recycleable materials are collected and processed together. Our project EcoSort aims to make sorting your recycling at home easier, with bin that automatically sorts your recycling using computer vision. EcoSort will place the item in one of four categories: plastic, metal, glass, and paper, and will do so without any additional user input beyond placing the item in the bin. We aim to both reduce micategorization and promote home recycling by making it easier for the average person.