Robotic quadcopter acrobatics like nothing we’ve seen

hackaday.com

95 points·mcantelon··8 comments

It looks like the bright lights in the room are being used for position sensing (along with what appear to be IR sensors on the top and bottom of the copter itself), so we don't have to worry about ninja quadcopters taking over our offices until they come up with a way to determine position without the help of IR blasters.

Yeah. I think it's a Vicon motion capture system.

http://www.vicon.com/

They're wildly expensive, but can give you sub-millimeter accuracy at like 100 Hz.

I also noticed in one view that ceiling has extremely uniform air ducting, presumably to prevent any kind of gusts (possibly to cause them though).

When I see this same demo being performed out in a field with a combination of variable rotating fans I'll start getting more concerned about robot overlords.

In the comments, I think he says it's controlled remotely by a computer hooked up to cameras. So unless you go around putting IR cameras in your house and broadcasting their feed, I think you'll be okay. For now.

Same topic as http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1387043

I looked at the video; was really impressed... then went outside; saw a dragon fly... simply amazing.

The beginning of skynet.

Say hello to the new super soldier. A tiny maneuverable information gathering robot backed up by field artillery.

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