The garage of the Mapping world in cylindric mapping of the omnidirectional view.

RoboCup Rescue

Description

The assignment for the RoboCup Rescue Simulation League is to build an Multi-Agent Community for Rescue Operations in Simulated environments. The Universiteit van Amsterdam has participated in the Rescue League since 2003, both in Germany and Italy, and participate remotely in the Rescue Middle Earth competition 2004. In 2006, the UvA participated in the new Virtual League in Bremen, where they became 3rd. Additionally they received a prize for their mapping algorithm. In Atlanta (RoboCup 2007), the team again reached the semi-finals. In Hannover (German Open 2008) the UvA reached the finals. Publications related to the Virtual League can be found at the wiki-site.

This year the Amsterdam will participate in two RoboCup competitions. At the German Open competition, 21-25 April in Hannover, the UvA Rescue Team consisted of Arnoud Visser and Aksel Ethembabaoglu. At the World Cup, 14-20 July in China, Amsterdam will join forces with Julian de Hoog from Oxford University. Our approach for the competition of 2008 is outlined in our team description paper.

The schedule and results in Hannover are as follows:

Monday April 22th : Mobility test (teleoperated two robots).
Result: 60 meters driven
Tuesday April 23th : Mapping test (two robots, one teleoperated and one autonomous).
Result: perfect map of 160 m^2.
Wednesday April 24th: Qualifying round (indoor reactor-c, explored with three robots).
Result: 189 m^2, 2 victims
Thursday-morning : Qualifying round (outdoor waterfront-a, explored with two robots).
Result: 458 m^2, 3 victims
Thursday-afternoon : Qualifying round (indoor reactor-b, explored with three robots).
Result: 150 m^2, 1 victim
Friday-morning : Final (indoor reactor-a, explored with three robots).
Result: 236 m^2, 1 victim
Friday-afternoon : Final (outdoor waterfront-a, explored with two robots).
Result: 227 m^2, no victim
UvA Rescue 2008 is the European runner up!

The schedule and the results of the Amsterdam Oxford Joint Rescue Forces at the RoboCup 2008 in Suzhou were as follows:

Wednesday July 16th : Mapping test (three robots, all semi-teleoperated).
Result: sharp map with two rotational errors.
Thursday July 17th : Outdoor test (four robots, all semi-teleoperated).
Result: sharp map of 357 m^2 with some small translational errors, one victim found
Thursday July 18th : Indoor run (three robots, all semi-teleoperated).
Result: nice map of 264 m^2 with minor translational errors, one victim found
Thursday July 19th : Outdoor run (three robots, all semi-teleoperated).
Result: small map without errors, no victims found
In Suzhou the communication worked fine with the new format. Julian incorporated successfully the interface to the camera into UsarCommander (after previous attempts at Atlanta and the German Open). With the new communication format the video stream can be used at full speed. Unfortunatelly, the new teams build their system from scratch on this advantage and could drive their robots fast through the environment based on the camera view. To succesfully compete, we should speed and scale up.

Links

Theses
  • Steven Roebert: Creating a bird-eye view map using an omnidirectional camera. Bachelor's thesis, Universiteit van Amsterdam (June 2008) ( PDF ).
  • Tijn Schmits: Development of a Catadioptric Omnidirectional Camera for the USARSim Environment. Master's thesis, Universiteit van Amsterdam (June 2008) (PDF).
Publications

See See the list of this year publications at Amsterdam Oxford Joint Rescue Forces website.

Updated 17 July 2008