Virtual RC Racing

Nipunn KoorapatiErik Schmidt Jacob OlsonRobert Liu

Concept

• Think Mario Kart with real RC cars

• Virtual race environment projected onto the ground

• Speed of car varies with terrain (like Mario Kart)

• Perhaps interactive items (Thunderbolts?!)

• Switching race tracks is easy 

After a few hours of hacking

Competitive Analysis

Mario Kart RC Race Set $100

Mario Kart Wii $50 

Intel Research at CES 2011  

Requirements

Functional:• Projected Racetrack• Individually Controlled Cars• Terrain Influences Speed

o Grass = Slowo Pavement = Fasto Out of Bounds = Off

Non Functional:• Low controller latency (< 50 ms)• Low terrain detection latency (< 100 ms)• Configurable Racetracks

Architecture

Technical Specifications

Software:• RC Controller Processing

o Arduino/Xbee• Car Location System

o Using OpenCV Image Processing

o Python bindings• Game Logic

o PyGame

Hardware:• Laptop• PicoProjector• Webcam• RC Cars• RC Controller

o Arduino Pro Minio XBee Wireless Moduleso XBee Explorer USB

Anticipated Risks & Mitigation• Risk: High Latency in image processing

o Tested out code run on our webcamo 15 FPS Webcam -> 14.9 FPS with image processing

• Risk: Image detection too inaccurate/finickyo Consulted someone with OpenCV experienceo Contrast colors in projected track with RC car colorso Use Optical Flow for accurate motion trackingo Backup plan: place infared beacons on each car