Author: mrhee

What did you personally accomplish this week on the project?

This week, I finetuned the vision module’s height and speed calculations to more accurately handle edge cases (box on the edge of the treadmill, tall box, etc.). I also finetuned the angles of the main file’s inverse kinematics outputs to align with the arm’s idiosyncracies (arm plane is slightly tilted). I was able to sync the main program’s axes/commands almost perfectly with the arm’s angle quirks to maximize accuracy. I also tweaked the timing/buffering of how the main file sends commands to the arm to ensure smoothness and reliability during pickup. In particular, it was previously having problems with moving the box up and to the bin after grabbing it. We were able to test the system on example boxes running on the treadmill and achieve 80% pickup success (8/10 runs).

Is your progress on schedule?

We are running on schedule.

What deliverables do you hope to complete in the next week?

I plan to finish the final presentation by next week, as I will be presenting on Monday. I also hope to make some physical bins and test the arm’s ability to drop the boxes in them, as we’ve currently only tested the arm dropping the box at the bin position.

What did you personally accomplish this week on the project?

This week, I tested the entire software system with the robotic arm. This involved running the main function, which relied on the QR scanning and kinematics modules to send commands to the Arduino controlling the arm. I was able to successfully verify the general logic of the main function and send accurate, fast commands to the robotic arm’s Arduino. One of our main concerns was that the delays of scanning the QR code, getting the box speed, sending the commands to the arm, and the arm actually moving would be too slow to efficiently grab the boxes on our relatively short treadmill. We were able to assuage those fears, as the system ran very quickly with time to spare. I greatly extended the main file this week, as it needed to be updated with the new additions I made to the QR scanning file and supplemented with the greater understanding I gained of the Arduino control inputs. I also spent a lot of time this week tweaking and improving the main and QR scanner files, as there were numerous issues with the accuracy and precision of predicting the box’s movements and converting the camera readings into real world coordinates relative to the arm (pixels -> centimeters).

Is your progress on schedule?

We are running on schedule.

What deliverables do you hope to complete in the next week?

I hope to continue testing the software system that runs on PC (vision, kinematics, and command modules) with the arm. The arm currently has some idiosyncrasies with the angles that haven’t been completely tested and mapped out. I plan to do some more robust testing of the vision module’s real-world mapping as well by placing boxes of different heights at specific locations on the treadmill running at specific speeds. Hopefully I’ll be able to verify that the real-world position/speed mappings are accurate now that I’ve revamped that code. I also hope to at least gain a better understanding of the exact arm angles relative to the command inputs, as I haven’t had that much time with the arm. Best case, by the end of the week, I will have the entire box-grabbing system working in a reliable and decently accurate manner.

What did you personally accomplish this week on the project?

This week, I tested the QR scanning code for getting the QR value, determining the box height, and determining the box speed/position on our complete system. Creating physical boxes and attaching various QR codes to them, I then ran them on the conveyor belt on different speed settings with our Brio3000 webcam mounted above. I was able to successfully verify the correctness and accuracy of the code to determine the box value, height, speed, and position.

Is your progress on schedule?

We are running on schedule.

What deliverables do you hope to complete in the next week?

I hope to finish linking our Python and Arduino code, which will enable us to test the QR scanning software and the robotic arm together. Hopefully we can also start testing the entire system next week, since the scanning system can currently acquire all the necessary metrics, and the robotic arm can currently pick up, move, and drop boxes.

What did you personally accomplish this week on the project?

This week, I completed the code for determining the box’s speed and depth (y-coordinate). This involved continuously tracking the QR codes using the webcam and estimating continuous center position movement over time. I tested it using our Brio3000 webcam on actual boxes moving on the treadmill, and it seems to work accurately.

Is your progress on schedule?

We are running on schedule, although we’re less ahead than we were a few weeks ago. With the hardware almost ready to be integrated with the CV / kinematics / control code, our overall progress should pick up again soon.

What deliverables do you hope to complete in the next week?

I plan on completing the Arduino code and the Python/Arduino interfacing code so that we can immediately run our software as soon as the arm is ready. Hopefully we can also start testing our QR / movement code with the arm.

What did you personally accomplish this week on the project?

This week, I completed the QR scanning code and successfully tested it using our Brio3000 webcam. In addition to reading the QR code value, I completed the code for getting the QR’s position and size. I also tested this on real-world QR codes using the Brio3000. This code should allow us to estimate a box’s depth and speed in our robotic arm system.

Is your progress on schedule?

We are definitely running on schedule. The software is ready to be tested with the arm/system.

What deliverables do you hope to complete in the next week?

I plan on testing the QR code on the entire treadmill system. This will involve mounting the webcam above the treadmill and running the QR code scanning, position, and size tests on real boxes that are moving on the treadmill.

What did you personally accomplish this week on the project?

This week, I completed the initial QR code scanning code and successfully tested it on an online QR code dataset. I also improved the main.py file to integrate both the vision and kinematics models and send out according placeholder commands to the Arduino.

Is your progress on schedule?

We are definitely on track. Hopefully we can ramp up in the next few weeks, as each individual module is reaching the point where we can put everything together.

What deliverables do you hope to complete in the next week?

I hope to test the QR code scanner using the camera that arrived this week. Hopefully I can also start connecting to the Arduino / arm to test the entire system.

What did you personally accomplish this week on the project?

This week, I completed the code for the kinematics equations in Python, wrote a code outline for connecting to and communicating with the Arduino, and helped Raunak start the code for QR code scanning. I also contributed to creating the design review presentation; specifically, I helped with writing the low-level breakdowns and images.

Is your progress on schedule?

We seem to be moving smoothly on / ahead of schedule. The software and hardware are both slightly ahead of our original targets.

What deliverables do you hope to complete in the next week?

I hope to finish the QR scanning code and get it working on online QR code test data sets. Ideally, I also hope to get it working on real-life QR codes that we print out, since our camera should arrive next week.