Artificial Vision for Mobile Robots

Book Description

To give mobile robots real autonomy, and to permit them to act efficiently in a diverse, cluttered, and changing environment, they must be equipped with powerful tools for perception and reasoning. Artificial Vision for Mobile Robots presents new theoretical and practical tools useful for providing mobile robots with artificial vision in three dimensions, including passive binocular and trinocular stereo vision, local and global 3D map reconstructions, fusion of local 3D maps into a global 3D map, 3D navigation, control of uncertainty, and strategies of perception. Numerous examples from research carried out at INRIA with the Esprit Depth and Motion Analysis project are presented in a clear and concise manner.

Nicolas Ayache is Research Director at INRIA, Le Chesnay, France.

Contents. General Introduction. Stereo Vision. Introduction. Calibration. Image Representation. Binocular Stereo Vision Constraints. Binocular Stereo Vision Algorithms. Experiments in Binocular Stereo Vision. Trinocular Stereo Vision, Outlook. Multisensory Perception. Introduction. A Unified Formalism. Geometric Representation. Construction of Visual Maps. Combining Visual Maps. Results: Matching and Motion. Results: Matching and Fusion. Outlook.

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Mixed bag, but "The Bicentennial Man" is the standout of the collection
Love Robots!
Great collection of stories & Asimov's thoughts on robots
One of two great collections of Asimov's shorts
A fine collection

Robot Visions
Isaac Asimov , and Ralph McQuarrie
Manufacturer: Roc
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0451450647
Release Date: 2004-07-06

Book Description

From the writer whose name is synonymous with the science of robotics comes five decades of robot visions-36 landmark stories and essays, plus three rare tales-gathered together in one volume

Customer Reviews:

Mixed bag, but "The Bicentennial Man" is the standout of the collection.......2007-07-29

Let's examine each of the story's storylines and rate it, in U.S. Navy fashion, outstanding, excellent, good, satisfactory or unsatisfactory. SPOILER ALERT. My descriptions of the storylines sometimes give the endings away.

"Robot Visions." Storyline: robot is sent into the future and discovers humanity will destroy itself and be replaced by robots -- and a robot in the present decides to let this happen and does what he can to make it happen. Asimov is capable of the highest of highs and the lowest of lows vis à vis humanity and humanism. For the highest of the highs, nothing tops "The Bicentennial Man." For the lowest of the lows, "Robot Visions" (the short story) would have to be a strong contender. Not only that, the story violates the First Law to boot, without any justification. Essentially, the short story is a further analysis of what happens when robots decide that they're better than humans and therefore decide to "through inaction, allow a human to come to harm." It's Nestor 10 all over again. It's also a continuation of the idea behind "That Thou Art Mindful of Him" but instead of being a warning like that short story, "Robot Visions" is a celebration of robots displacing humans.

Compounding this anti-human calumny is the fact that in the Introduction to the book, Asimov badmouths the play "R.U.R." (p 6) which contains the prototype of the "robots become human-like and kill us" storyline. With no acknowledgement of the contradiction, in "Robot Visions" Asimov takes that storyline and almost lyrically embraces it. For all our flaws, we are at the top of the food chain and should stay that way. The thought that it is an absolute good that we should be killed and replaced by another species, especially one of our own creation, is anathema. It's horrible, disgusting and vile. And no, I don't think Asimov was providing a warning like in "That Thou Art Mindful of Him." I think he really finds the idea of humans dying off but robots remaining to be a great idea (see pp 422, 443). Rating: unsatisfactory.

"Too Bad!" Storyline: robot is miniaturized to be injected into a cancer patient. This is either the prototype of, or a takeoff on, "Fantastic Voyage." Rating: good.

"Robbie." Storyline: a little girl's robot taken away by parents but she is eventually reunited with him. Good characterization, especially considering the fact that this is Asimov's first short story. It's been updated a bit (e.g., the Three Laws and Susan Calvin are mentioned) and I'm sure otherwise tightened up, but the story still stands after nearly 70 years. Rating: excellent.

"Reason." Storyline: a new type of robot becomes convinced he's the prophet for the "God" of a space station. It's an interesting analysis of what occurs when you juxtapose a priori knowledge with a posteriori knowledge, and the analysis is delivered humorously. Asimov certainly needles religion a bit, especially Mohammedism. Rating: excellent.

"Liar!" Storyline: a mind-reading robot tells humans what they want to hear, not what's true, leading to an inevitable collision between hopes and reality. This is the ur-story of mind-reading robots in Asimov's later books, developed further in "The Robots of Dawn." Rating: good.

"Runaround." Storyline: a robot is equipoised between the Second Law and the Third Law -- and only the First Law can snap him out of it. Rating: good.

"Evidence." Storyline: is that D.A. running for mayor really a robot? Susan Calvin intends to find out. Good twist on the end, but one I guessed. Rating: good.

"Little Lost Robot." Storyline: a robot with a weakened First Law hides among other robots; it's up to Susan Calvin to ferret him out by playing to his ego. The 2004 movie "I, Robot" is based in part on this short story, and both the movie and this short story deserve a rating of excellent.

"The Evitable Conflict." Storyline: Susan Calvin tries to understand why machine-guided industrial activities are not performing optimally, and discovers the machines are discrediting their political rivals -- humans. An interesting premise, fairly well done, but once again Asimov seems to be endorsing the concept of machines taking over our free will. Without free will, what makes humans so different from the animals? Read Williamson's "With Folded Hands" for the logical endpoint to this reasoning. I must also point out that the short story contains a writing flaw. The Europe Region contains Egypt (p 206) yet the Tropic Region is supposedly ascendant "for the first time since the Pharaohs" (p 212), who were located in Egypt. A minor flaw in Asimov's writing but frankly an easy one to spot. Rating: satisfactory.

"Feminine Intuition." Storyline: Susan Calvin must determine who overheard the important last words of an intuitive robot. Good story and good detective work. Rating: excellent.

"The Bicentennial Man." Storyline: a robot decides that to be human is a goal worth more than even his life; in 200 years he accomplishes his goal. This is, IMHO, Asimov's greatest short story (and according to him, his third-favorite). It makes the most of characters and is a celebration of humanity. Rating: outstanding.

"Someday." A robot toy, abused by its young owner, demonstrates it's at least capable of contemplating revenge. The story breaks no new ground. Rating: satisfactory.

"Think!" Storyline: a telepathy-producing device is able to pick up a computer's thoughts. It's a surface exploration of the perennial question "can computers become self-aware?" but doesn't address the question of "and if they do, then what?" It could be that Asimov means for *us* to Think! about the answer to that question. Rating: good.

"Segregationist." Storyline: humans are being operated on to become more like robots, while robots are being operated on to become more human. The new miscegenation? This story actually has nothing to do with segregation and would be more appropriately titled "Anti-miscegenationist," though I suppose that doesn't have the same ring. This story surely resonated more in 1967 when it was published than it does now. It also contradicts later Asimov work (Robots and Empire?) that states that robots can never be surgeons. Rating: satisfactory.

"Mirror Image." Storyline: Elijah Bailey interviews two robots to determine which of their owners stole an important mathematical theory, using logic and psychology to catch his man. I do have to point out that Asimov sort of contradicts the reasoning in this short story in his later Daneel Olivaw books, particularly "The Robots of Dawn," which states that it is very difficult to drive a robot into stasis. That said, this short story still deserves a rating of excellent.

Lenny." Storyline: a robot with a childlike brain becomes Susan Calvin's surrogate son. Rating: satisfactory.

"Galley Slave." Storyline: a robot is falsely accused of manipulating the galley proofs of a book, and the perpetrator of the falsehood, through ignorance of robots, is tricked into admitting he manipulated the proofs himself. The title demonstrates Asimov's fondness for puns, and addresses the issue of whether it is a good thing to have robots taking over more and more of work related to the creative process. It reminds me a bit of an article from five or six years ago about how a computer program could write a sports story. Rating: good.

"Christmas Without Rodney." Storyline: a child's misbehavior makes a robot wish the Three Laws didn't exist. This story presents an interesting analysis of the continuum of thoughts to actions -- if a robot could think about wishing there were no Three Laws, isn't that a first step to disobeying them? In fact, isn't that the first step to human sin, thinking about doing something wrong and wishing there weren't rules prohibiting it? Interesting. Rating: excellent.

Asimov's essays. The essays provide no extraordinary insight into either man or machine, and are repetitive of each other and the Introduction. In the essays Asimov also alludes more strongly to his politics, which is about what you'd expect for a New York writer (e.g., "...consider what we're doing to ourselves right now--to all living things and to the very planet we live on. Maybe it is *time* we were replaced." p 422). He's also at times quite churlish about "his" Three Laws (e.g., p 457). I lost a lot of respect for Isaac Asimov the person by reading these essays. Rating: unsatisfactory.

Love Robots!.......2007-07-21

Bought this book to add to the Asimov Books already read----half finished this book and it is a very good collection---easy read---

if you like Robot books the following may be of interest to you,

****Issac Asimov -
****The Robot Books
Asimov had a sugested reading sequence HE published in Prelude to Foundation --- for all the books he had written on robots
---am listing that here - they were not written in sequence as you see.

The Complete Robot - 1982
The Caves of Steel - 1954
The Naked Sun - 1957
The Robots of Dawn -1983
Robots and Empire - 1985
The Currents of Space - 1952
The Stars, Like Dust - 1951
Pebble in the Sky - 1950
Prelude to Foundation - 1988
Foundation - 1951
Foundation and Empire - 1952
Second Foundation - 1953
Foundation's Edge - 1982
Foundation Earth - 1983

peace and love----

Great collection of stories & Asimov's thoughts on robots.......2004-11-11

This is a companion book to "Robot Dreams," but unlike that book, all the stories in "Robot Visions" are actually about robots. Six of the stories also appear in the collection "I, Robot." The stories were written over a wide range of time, from 1940 to 1989, and they reflect the character of their times. (The way to check when a particular story was written is to look at the copyright page at the front of the book.) The stories cover a range of issues well, mostly hinging on the three laws of robotics that Asimov quotes and uses repeatedly. One might think going back to the well like this would result in repetetive stories, but that is not the case at all; robots are involved in these stories in jobs as mundane as checking galleys for publication to jobs as unforgiving as performing microsurgery, and in all cases Asimov carefully considers how the humans and robots--each acting on their motivations (the robots' is hardwired, of course)--interact with each other and the situations they are confronted with. One stands out: "The Bicentennial Man," about a robot who was unusually creative, and over a period of decades acts on his desire to become more independent and acquire more rights, going so far as to replace his robotic systems with organic ones in an attempt to become closer to being human.

The book includes a number of essays by Asimov about how he sees robots in the future, how he conceived of them in past stories, and what issues will crop up as mechanical intelligences become reality. These essays were written in the '70s and 80s, some apparently for American Airlines' in-flight magazine (again, check the copyright page). These essays are each relatively short, making them good bedtime reading when you're tired. The short stories earlier in the book vary in length, so they don't work as well for that purpose.

One of two great collections of Asimov's shorts.......2003-12-16

Robot Visions and Robot Dreams would not be complete without each other. Robot Visions is actually the better of the two, showing a little more variety in the stories and a little more creativity (as if you could imagine Isaac Asimov being anything but creative). If you like stories about robots, these are the stories that every other writer wishes they thought of first.

A fine collection.......2003-09-12

Like its companion _Robot Dreams_, this collection is in part an excuse to feature the haunting illustrations of Ralph McQuarrie and partly a well-chosen selection of the Good Doctor's short writings.

However, unlike _Robot Dreams_, this one really does concentrate on robots. It also includes a good chunk of Asimov's nonfiction on the subject -- and (unlike Heinlein) Asimov wrote very good nonfiction too.

Two things you should know before you buy this:

(1) It includes most of the contents of _I, Robot_, but not all -- and it also doesn't include the frame story (the interview with Susan Calvin). So even if you buy this, you'll still have to get _I, Robot_ if you don't already have it.

(2) It includes the robot stories that _aren't_ part of _I, Robot_ -- among them the very best Susan Calvin story, "Galley Slave".

Book Description

This book presents a coherent approach to the fast moving field of machine vision, using a consistent notation based on a detailed understanding of the image formation process. It covers even the most recent research and will provide a useful and current reference for professionals working in the fields of machine vision, image processing, and pattern recognition.

An outgrowth of the author's course at MIT, Robot Vision presents a solid framework for understanding existing work and planning future research. Its coverage includes a great deal of material that important to engineers applying machine vision methods in the real world. The chapters on binary image processing, for example, help explain and suggest how to improve the many commercial devices now available. And the material on photometric stereo and the extended Gaussian image points the way to what may be the next thrust in commercialization of the results in this area. The many exercises complement and extend the material in the text, and an extensive bibliography will serve as a useful guide to current research.

Contents: Image Formation and Image Sensing. Binary Images: Geometrical Properties; Topological Properties. Regions and Image Segmentation. Image Processing: Continuous Images; Discrete Images. Edges and Edge Finding. Lightness and Color. Reflectance Map: Photometric Stereo Reflectance Map; Shape from Shading. Motion Field and Optical Flow. Photogrammetry and Stereo. Pattern Classification. Polyhedral Objects. Extended Gaussian Images. Passive Navigation and Structure from Motion. Picking Parts out of a Bin.

Berthold Klaus Paul Horn is Associate Professor, Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, MIT. Robot Vision is included in the MIT Electrical Engineering and Computer Science Series.

Customer Reviews:

A great old book on the fundamentals of computer vision.......2007-01-31

This book does a good job of introducing the readers to the basics of computer vision - it really has nothing to do with robots outside of the last chapter, other than if you build one and need to give it vision capabilities, you need to know the information in this book. Physics equations via calculus and ODE are used to describe how light intereacts with solid objects and also with image sensors, the latter tieing in to the subject of robot vision. Therefore, the reader should have a good knowledge of first-year university physics as well as multi-variable calculus. As a reference for the geometrical and physical mathematics of light interacting with surfaces and the camera, it is particularly excellent.

Horn does a great job of deriving and providing the equations you need, and brings it all together with excellent narrative and very good illustrations. The book goes all the way from the basics of image formation, to simple matrix operations such as edge detection, to some more advanced topics such as shape from shading. The final chapter, on picking parts out of a bin, uses the ideas developed in previous chapters to come up with the basic design of a robot hand-eye system that is capable of picking up specific parts from a parts bin. It really is a very good unifying capstone to the entire book. The only drawback I can see in the book is that it pretty much stays in the domain of continuous mathematics. There is not much in the way of explicit algorithm steps - the author expects the reader to be able to do that based on his explanation and equations, and given the high quality of the text this is really not too rash of an assumption.

Because of its age it doesn't have some of the more modern techniques and algorithms, but if I had to choose between this older book and that more recently published waste of trees, "Computer Vision: A Modern Approach", give me this book every time. You get a firm foundation in the basics, plus a good understanding of some more advanced topics too.

Just The Bible for Computer Vision !.......2006-04-29

If anyone wants to learn the basics of Computer Vision, this book must be the starting point. No other go.. This speaks of the exceptional treatment of the concepts in this classic book. I very strongly recommend this indispensible book to anyone who wants to learn Computer Vision.

Just Classic Book.......2005-10-08

A classic book covering all the fundmentals. Recommend to those who want to know something about vision before doing some real research.

Good introduction to Computer and Robot Vision.......2003-12-04

I have to admit that I read this book many years ago. This is not a book that should be read as a way to keep oneself updated on the latest research in the field. It should be seen as a comprehensive, but systematic introduction to basic machine vision techniques. As such, it is a great book, maybe a classic. Its focus is on such topics as Binary Image Processing, Optics, Image formation, Transforms, Filtering, Stereo vision, Optical flow, Noise reduction, etc. It is well organized, and it covers the fundamentals of many useful techniques.

The Classic of Computer Vision.......2000-06-12

When I first picked up Robot Vision, I was a bit concerned at the age of the book: the field of computer/machine/robot vision progresses at a fantastic pace, and it would seem a given that such a book would be so out of date as to be useless.

However, while this book might not reflect the latest research, especially the tight interweaving of computer graphics and computer vision as exists now or in areas such as active vision, it is a rich presentation of the core ideas of machine vision. In particular, it provides a mathematically rigorous presentation, focusing on core notions of geometric optics and calibration, as well as classic approaches to segmentation, edge detection, signal filtering, and the like.

Book Description

Machine Vision technology is becoming an indispensible part of the manufacturing industry. Biomedical and scientific applications of machine vision and imaging are becoming more and more sophisticated, and new applications continue to emerge. This book gives an overview of ongoing research in machine vision and presents the key issues of scientific and practical interest. A selected board of experts from the US, Japan and Europe provides an insight into some of the latest work done on machine vision systems and appliccations.

Specialized Computer Architectures for Robotics and Automation

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Specialized Computer Architectures for Robotics and Automation
J. Graham
Manufacturer: Routledge
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 2881241549

FastSLAM: A Scalable Method for the Simultaneous Localization and Mapping Problem in Robotics (Springer Tracts in Advanced Robotics)

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FastSLAM: A Scalable Method for the Simultaneous Localization and Mapping Problem in Robotics (Springer Tracts in Advanced Robotics)
Michael Montemerlo , and Sebastian Thrun
Manufacturer: Springer
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Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 3540463992

Book Description

This monograph describes a new family of algorithms for the simultaneous localization and mapping problem in robotics (SLAM). SLAM addresses the problem of acquiring an environment map with a roving robot, while simultaneously localizing the robot relative to this map. This problem has received enormous attention in the robotics community in the past few years, reaching a peak of popularity on the occasion of the DARPA Grand Challenge in October 2005, which was won by the team headed by the authors. The FastSLAM family of algorithms applies particle filters to the SLAM Problem, which provides new insights into the data association problem that is paramount in SLAM. The FastSLAM-type algorithms have enabled robots to acquire maps of unprecedented size and accuracy, in a number of robot application domains and have been successfully applied in different dynamic environments, including the solution to the problem of people tracking.

3D Model Recognition from Stereoscopic Cues (Artificial Intelligence Series)

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3D Model Recognition from Stereoscopic Cues (Artificial Intelligence Series)

Manufacturer: The MIT Press
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Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0262132435

Book Description

3D Model Recognition from Stereoscopic Cues provides a rich, integrated account of work done within a large-scale, multisite, Alvey-funded collaborative project in computer vision. It presents a variety of methods for deriving surface descriptions from stereoscopic data and for matching those descriptions to three-dimensional models for the purposes of object recognition, vision verification, autonomous vehicle guidance, and robot workstation guidance. State of the art vision systems are. described in sufficient detail to allow researchers to replicate the results.

John P. Frisby is Professor of Psychology at the University of Sheffield where John E. W. Mayhew is Scientific Director of the AI Vision Unit.

Partial Contents: The PMF Stereo Algorithm Project. A Dynamic Programming Algorithm for Binocular Stereo Vision. Stereo Matching Using Intra- and Inter-Row Dynamic Programming. A Computational Theory of Stereo Vision. A Piplid Architecture for the Canny Edge Detector. Estimation of Stereo and Motion Parameters Using a Variational Principle. The 2.5D Sketch Project. Segmentation and Description of Binocularly Viewed Contours. Inferring Surface Shape by Specular Stereo. Surface Descriptions from Stereo and Shading. The 3D Model-Based Vision Project. Matching Geometrical Descriptions in ThreeSpace. Advances in 3D Model Indentification from Stereo Data. Dupin's Cyclide and the Cyclide Patch. Geometric Reasoning in a Parallel Network. SMS: A Suggestive Modelling System for Object Recognition. WPFM: The Workspace Prediction and Fast Matching System. The Design of the IMAGINE II Scene Analysis Program. Overview. TINA: A 3D Vision System for Pick and Place.

Active Computer Vision by Cooperative Focus and Stereo (Springer Series in Perception Engineering)

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Active Computer Vision by Cooperative Focus and Stereo (Springer Series in Perception Engineering)
Eric Paul Krotkov
Manufacturer: Springer-Verlag
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Active Perception and Robot Vision (Nato a S I Series Series III, Computer and Systems Sciences)

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Active Perception and Robot Vision (Nato a S I Series Series III, Computer and Systems Sciences)
Arun K. Sood
Manufacturer: Springer
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ASIN: 038755047X

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Intelligent robotics has become the focus of extensive research activity. This effort has been motivated by the wide variety of applications that can benefit from the developments. These applications often involve mobile robots, multiple robots working and interacting in the same work area, and operations in hazardous environments like nuclear power plants. Applications in the consumer and service sectors are also attracting interest. These applications have highlighted the importance of performance, safety, reliability, and fault tolerance. This volume is a selection of papers from a NATO Advanced Study Institute held in July 1989 with a focus on active perception and robot vision. The papers deal with such issues as motion understanding, 3-D data analysis, error minimization, object and environment modeling, object detection and recognition, parallel and real-time vision, and data fusion. The paradigm underlying the papers is that robotic systems require repeated and hierarchical application of the perception-planning-action cycle. The primary focus of the papers is the perception part of the cycle. Issues related to complete implementations are also discussed.

Active Robot Vision: Camera Heads, Model Based Navigation and Reactive Control (Series in Machine Perception and Artificial Intelligence, Vol 6)

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Active Robot Vision: Camera Heads, Model Based Navigation and Reactive Control (Series in Machine Perception and Artificial Intelligence, Vol 6)

Manufacturer: World Scientific Pub Co Inc
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Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 9810213212

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