Dynamic Nonprehensile Manipulation of a Moving Object Using a Batting Primitive

Abstract

To achieve human-level object manipulation capability, a robot must be able to handle objects not only with prehensile manipulation, such as pick-and-place, but also with nonprehensile manipulation. To study nonprehensile manipulation, we studied robotic batting, a primitive form of nonprehensile manipulation. Batting is a challenging research area because it requires sophisticated and fast manipulation of moving objects and requires considerable improvement. In this paper, we designed a batting system for dynamic manipulation of a moving ball and proposed several algorithms to improve the task performance of batting. To improve the recognition accuracy of the ball, we proposed a circle-fitting method that complements color segmentation. This method enabled robust ball recognition against illumination. To accurately estimate the trajectory of the recognized ball, weighted least-squares regression considering the accuracy according to the distance of a stereo vision sensor was used for trajectory estimation, which enabled more accurate and faster trajectory estimation of the ball. Further, we analyzed the factors influencing the success rate of ball direction control and applied a constant posture control method to improve the success rate. Through the proposed methods, the ball direction control performance is improved.

Special Issue on Trends and Challenges in Robotic Applications

“…It involves the development of algorithms and techniques that allow machines to process, analyze and extract meaningful insights from images and videos. In recent years, computer vision has undergone significant advancements, leading to the emergence of new technologies that allow for new interaction applications; for example, in [16], a moving object is manipulated by means of batting primitive to play table tennis with a human player.…”

Vibrational Transportation on a Platform Subjected to Sinusoidal Displacement Cycles Employing Dry Friction Control

“…Therefore, this is a very relevant topic in science and modern engineering for a vast range of industries such as automotive, aeronautical, electronic, mechatronics, medicine, or biotechnology. There are many methods to move an object in a nonprehensile way, such as pushing by various robot arms [4,5], catching [6], batting/juggling [7][8][9], employing various planar manipulators [10][11][12][13][14], using various acoustic manipulation systems [15][16][17][18], or using active transportation surfaces where the object's motion is achieved through controlled deformations generated by arrays of actuators [19]. However, vibration assisted methods, where friction phenomena play a major role, are some of the most versatile, easily implemented, cost effective, and efficient methods [20].…”