WebCam

Well, apparently, the best true resolution you can currently get out of a webcam is 2 MegaPixels. You can get 8-10 MP with interpolation. HP has just released the Elite with a 3MP sensor, but it's 5-6 fps at that.

Decided to go with the Logitech Orbit AF. The Logitech QuickCam Pro 9000 was a close second. Looks like it's basically the same camera. But I went with the Orbit's stand option and the fact that it has a motor tracking which I'll eventually have to do anyway, so it might save me some money and build time if I have any control over it through software. And it may prove useful on its own.

Also, I'm looking at this USB I/O board, from ApogeeKits. Seems to have the most bang for the buck.

Initial Mark I Run

Here are some videos from the test runs. In the first three videos I just created a program to go forward for 3 seconds, turn right 3 seconds, turn left 3 seconds, backwards 3 seconds.

1/4 full power. Didn't fix the problems with the drive train yet:

Tightened down the belts and tried it again at 1/4 power:

Try again at 1/2 full power. Much better:

So now I wanted to load the control program I wrote earlier onto another computer and see if I could control it remotely. Fortunately, I was watching my friend's dog Katy for the week so it made the experiment a lot more fun.

Now I need to tune the drive belts so they move roughly in synch and retune the turning code so that I can get more precise directional control.

After that I need to decide if I should start adding some input sensors, build encoders for the motors so that I can precisely control their movement or just go ahead and buy the video camera and try to work around the movement idiosyncracies.

Base Complete

Ok, last week or so I finally finished putting together the battery mount, the charger mount, mounting the motor driver to the chassis and all the essential wiring to start playing with it.

And built a holder for the laptop so it can run indepedently.

Now it's time to try it out!