Line Following Visual Servoing for Aerial Robots Combined with Complementary Sensors

This article addresses the problem of visual line following for aerial robotic vehicles, considering an airship as platform. Previous work showed that targets characterized by three parallel lines make possible to assure a unique pose for the aerial robot. Here, twoline targets are considered, what leaves two d.o.f. unconstrained by the visual servo control. In this case, other than visual signals provided by an onboard camera, complementary sensorial information is needed to fully control the vehicle states. The sensor suite comprises also an airspeed sensor and a sensor to measure the airship rotation around its longitudinal axis. A two-line following sensor-based scheme using an output error LQ regulator with PID structure is detailed. Simulation results, obtained by using a complete airship dynamic model, are presented.

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