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Robotics Lab Week 08 - Laser Range Finder For Obstacle Avoidance (Updated)

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24 views24 pages

Robotics Lab Week 08 - Laser Range Finder For Obstacle Avoidance (Updated)

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hamzanaeem2001200
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ROBOTICS LAB 8

Laser Range Finder


MUNADI SIAL

SCHOOL OF ELECTRICAL ENGINEERING AND COMPUTER SCIENCE


NATIONAL UNIVERSITY OF SCIENCES AND TECHNOLOGY
Overview
This lab will focus on the following:
• Subscribing to the Laser Scan topic
• Acquiring data from the Laser Range Finder
• Wandering Robot
• Wall Following Robot
Overview
• We have looked at ROS communication between nodes via topics
• We have also looked at the actuating aspect of robotics (twist messages)

• In this lab, we will turn our attention to the sensing aspect of robotics
• Specifically, the focus will be on the Laser Range Finder which is a proximity sensor
used widely for mapping, localization, obstacle avoidance and navigation purposes
• This lab will involve learning to use the laser data, then developing simple
implementations for wandering and wall following
Sensors
Sensors are devices used to get useful information from the environment

Vision Sensor LASER Scanner SONAR


CCD/CMOS camera Measures distance from Measures distance
obstacle from obstacle
Sensors
Sensors are devices used to get useful information from the environment

Encoder Tachometer GPS


Measures angular Measures angular velocity Measures location in outdoor
position environments
Sensors
Sensors are devices used to get useful information from the environment

IMU Accelerometer Rate Gyroscope


Accelerometer and Measures linear Measures angular velocity
gyroscope combined acceleration of the body to which it is
(compass is also included attached
sometimes)
Sensors
Sensors are devices used to get useful information from the environment

Tactile Sensor Kinect Sensor


Used to sense touch by Projects “structured light” on the scene and the change in
detecting bumps pattern is used to obtain information of the scene
geometry
Range Sensors
• A Range Sensor is a device that measures the distance to
nearby, external objects
• Examples of range sensors include
o Sonars
o Radars
o Laser Range Finders
o Structured Light

Kinect Sensor
It projects
“structured light”
Sonar Sensor Laser Range Finder on the scene
Laser Range Finder
• A Laser Range Finder measures the distance from
an object by firing numerous lasers and then
obtaining the reflected response

• Laser range finders have some advantages


compared to other range sensors
o Larger distance range
o Larger field of view (even up to 360o around)
o Higher frequency of measurements
o Higher accuracy in measurements
Laser Range Finder
• For indoor applications (where GPS is not practical), laser range finders are used
for mapping, localization and obstacle avoidance
• For outdoor applications, laser range finders are used in autonomous cars to
detect pedestrians and traffic. Due to the high speed of such cars, the laser
sensors must have a large range, e.g. the Velodyne HDL-64E (shown) has a range of
50 m and an accuracy within 2 cm
Limitations
Like any other sensor, laser range finder has its own limitations:

• Measurement noise: Sensor readings are subjected to noise due to limited


resolution, atmospheric effects etc

• Specular reflections: Sensor readings are missed when the fired rays bounce
off of objects at varied angles

• Ambient light: Some laser scanners fail to measure objects in the presence
of bright sunlight

• Transparent objects: Laser scans will give much larger distances if the fired
lasers pass through the object
Laser Modification
• To modify the laser in the
robot, the values in the
model.sdf file need to be
changed
• The sdf file contains XML code
for the geometry of the robot
and its individual parts
(including the laser)
• We will alter the values for the
samples, min_angle and
max_angle tags in the sdf file
Message Libraries
• The std_msgs library contains message types for standard messages:
o Int32
o Float32
o String

• The geometry_msgs library contains message types for geometric data:


o Pose
o Point
o Twist
o Quaternion

• The sensor_msgs library contains message types for sensor data:


o Image
o LaserScan
o PointCloud
o MagneticFIeld
Laser Scan in ROS
• A robot with a laser field of
180o span is shown
• The origin of the Laser
Frame is placed at the point
where the lasers emerge.
• In the robot, the lasers are
emitted from the very front
of the robot’s body
Laser Scan in ROS
Consider a robot with a laser
spanning 180o and 5 laser
samples:
• Left
• Front-left
• Front
• Front-right
• Right

The obstacles are shown to


be hit by 2 lasers (front-left
and right)
Laser Scan in ROS msg.ranges[2]
To get laser data, we create a
subscriber node and subscribe msg.ranges[1]
to the ‘scan’ topic which msg.ranges[3]
receives messages of type
LaserScan (sensor_msgs)

If the message instance in the msg.ranges[4] msg.ranges[0]


callback is msg, then the
distance values of a laser
sample can be obtained by the
ranges attribute of LaserScan

range_value = msg.ranges[index]
Laser Scan in ROS msg.ranges[2]

msg.ranges[1]
msg.ranges[3]

msg.ranges[4] msg.ranges[0]
For the 5 laser samples, we
can get the data by:
range_R = msg.ranges[0]
range_FR = msg.ranges[1]
range_F = msg.ranges[2]
range_FL = msg.ranges[3]
range_L = msg.ranges[4]
Laser Scan in ROS Inf
The 2 lasers that hit the
obstacles give out proper values Inf
for the distance

The 3 lasers that do not hit any


obstacle give the out of range 9.0349
values; infinity
Such values pose problems Inf
mathematically
8.8644
range_R = msg.ranges[0]
range_FR = msg.ranges[1]
range_F = msg.ranges[2]
range_FL = msg.ranges[3]
range_L = msg.ranges[4]
Laser Scan in ROS 10
To solve the problem of infinite
values, we assign the max 10
measurable value (laser range)
in place of the infinite value

9.0349
For instance, if the max distance
is 10, then we can get the 10
ranges by:
8.8644
range_R = min(msg.ranges[0],10)
range_FR = min(msg.ranges[1],10)
range_F = min(msg.ranges[2],10)
range_FL = min(msg.ranges[3],10)
range_L = min(msg.ranges[4],10)
Laser Scan in ROS
In practical situations, we use a
large number of laser samples for
greater effectiveness and for
implementing more complex
algorithms
Laser Scan in ROS
The laser samples are divided into
regions. We can get region values by
using the minimum value of the
laser sample in that region

For instance, to get region


values for 36 laser samples:
R = min(min(msg.ranges[0:7]) ,10)
FR = min(min(msg.ranges[7:14]) ,10)
F = min(min(msg.ranges[14:21]),10)
FL = min(min(msg.ranges[21:28]),10)
L = min(min(msg.ranges[28:35]),10)
Laser Scan in ROS
R = min(min(msg.ranges[0:7]) ,10)
FR = min(min(msg.ranges[7:14]) ,10)
F = min(min(msg.ranges[14:21]),10)
FL = min(min(msg.ranges[21:28]),10)
L = min(min(msg.ranges[28:35]),10)

We can generalize the above 5 regions for x number of laser samples:


x = len(msg.ranges)
R = min(min(msg.ranges[0*x//5 : (1*x-1)//5]), max_dist)
FR = min(min(msg.ranges[1*x//5 : (2*x-1)//5]), max_dist)
F = min(min(msg.ranges[2*x//5 : (3*x-1)//5]), max_dist)
FL = min(min(msg.ranges[3*x//5 : (4*x-1)//5]), max_dist)
L = min(min(msg.ranges[4*x//5 : (5*x-1)//5]), max_dist)
Wall Following
In this lab, we will look at wall
following around obstacles
which can be either convex or
concave in shape

A shape is called convex if every


straight line made by any two
points in the shape, will pass
through the shape only once

If the line passes through the


object more than once, the
shape is concave
Lab Tasks

 Download the manual from LMS


 Perform the Lab Tasks as given in the manual and submit it on LMS
 Remember to execute scripts with the terminal

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