Obstacle Avoidance using Event-based Visual Sensor and Time-To-Contact Processing

摘要

Optic Flow is known to be useful in detecting obstacles and measuring Time-To-Contact, while event-based vision sensors have recently emerged as an efficient low-latency alternative to traditional frame-based vision sensors. This paper combines these two areas to present a visual collision avoidance system based on Optic Flow and Time-To-Contact computation using an event-based sensor. For demonstration, a quadrotor was fitted with the system and collision avoidance was tested. The quadrotor is shown successfully evading obstacles while flying at speeds up to 2.5m.s~(-1). The quadrotor performs an evasive manoeuver which can either be a turn away from the obstacle, or a complete stop (if no safe forward path is detected). An example of an obstacle detection shows that the maximal Time-To-Contact error is below 1.2s. A video of the different experiments is provided as supplementary data.