AUTOMATIC TRAVELING DEVICE USING VISUAL SENSOR

PURPOSE:To realize an automatic traveling system without using any special track like a reflective tape, etc., by recognizing the driving target line caught by a visual sensor as a straight line for control of the position and direction errors. CONSTITUTION:The images obtained by a camera 1 are stored in a video memory, etc., via a camera controller 5 and data are sent to a picture processor 6 for linearization. When a picture serving as a traveling target line 10 is obtained within a viewfield 9, these picture signals are processed by the processor 6 and a straight traveling target line 11 is obtained. The signals of the processor 6 are processed by a position/direction controller 7. Thus a position error DELTAX and a direction error DELTAtheta are obtained for a traveling object containing the camera 1. A traveling reference line 12 and a position error reference line 13 are set at the center of the viewfield 9. The controller 7 performs the processing to obtain the controlled variable of a steering system from both errors DELTAX and DELTAtheta.