These experiments are done with a very large, very fast computer on the ground, and many cameras watching the drone from all angles, in a controlled lab environment.  The computer then tells the drone motors what to do. Nothing at all like what the Mavic or Phantom does everyday, outdoors, with wind blowing.

Raffaello is professor at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH) in Zurich.

hariedo Posted at 2017-2-3 19:41
These experiments are done with a very large, very fast computer on the ground, and many cameras watching the drone from all angles, in a controlled lab environment.  The computer then tells the drone motors what to do. Nothing at all like what the Mavic or Phantom does everyday, outdoors, with wind blowing.

so all the processing power is being feed from desktop computer ok and the mavic has 24 core processor how is that this technology algorithm cannot be put into the software of the DJI go 4 with the technology that is already embedded in the mavic, and all the rest of the drones that could handle this algorithm... with its ESC flight controller board and the cpu it has. Or it does not have to be all the algorithm but some of the portion of that techology script to be process with the internal CPU and flight controller of the drones built by DJI....

That´s an amazing tech demo! Unfortunately he doesn´t go into any detail (other than telling everything is algoriiiiithmsssss!)  but for sure what they do is impressive, an opens a big door on industrial applications for quads!

watuse Posted at 2017-2-3 22:20
so all the processing power is being feed from desktop computer ok and the mavic has 24 core processor how is that this technology algorithm cannot be put into the software of the DJI go 4 with the technology that is already embedded in the mavic, and all the rest of the drones that could handle this algorithm... with its ESC flight controller board and the cpu it has. Or it does not have to be all the algorithm but some of the portion of that techology script to be process with the internal CPU and flight controller of the drones built by DJI....

Sure, processing power will fit anywhere.  The point is that the sensors required to coordinate the absolute frame of reference can't be on-board.  You can't rely on perfectly aimed infrared lights and perfectly positioned cameras surrounding the flight space of your hobby drone, which allows this demonstration.  GPS and even on-board cameras have a lot worse repeatability error.