KR20030097554A - Robot cleaner and system thereof - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE: A robot cleaner and a system thereof are provided to have broad visual field and to quickly perform the process of position recognition by mounting a camera having a fisheye lens for wide angle. CONSTITUTION: A robot cleaner is composed of a driving unit(15) driving a plurality of wheels, a dust suction unit(11) sucking dust, and a plurality of cameras(13,14) installed at a cleaner body and photographing outer environment. The cameras have a fisheye lens for wide angle.

Description

Robot cleaner and system

The present invention relates to a robot cleaner and a system thereof, and more particularly, to a robot cleaner and a system capable of capturing an external environment with a wider viewing angle.

In general, the robot cleaner refers to a device that performs a cleaning operation of sucking dust and foreign substances from the floor while driving itself in a cleaning area to be cleaned without a user's manipulation.

The robot cleaner determines the distance to obstacles such as furniture, office supplies, and walls installed in the cleaning area through the sensor, and cleans the cleaning area while controlling the collision with the obstacle using the determined information.

Such a robot cleaner is equipped with a camera for photographing the external environment for use for location recognition and monitoring. However, the conventional robot cleaner has a disadvantage in that it takes a long time to find a specific image for location recognition because the viewing angle that can be acquired through one imaging process is narrowed by applying a camera to which a lens capable of capturing a linear image is applied. have. That is, if a specific image does not exist within the limited viewing angle, it is inconvenient to find a specific image by running a robot cleaner so that the image can be captured again with respect to an area outside the viewing angle.

The present invention was devised to improve the above problems, and an object thereof is to provide a robot cleaner and a system in which a viewing angle capable of capturing at one time can be extended.

1 is a perspective view schematically showing a robot cleaner according to the present invention;

FIG. 2 is a block diagram illustrating a robot cleaner system to which the robot cleaner of FIG. 1 is applied.

3 is a block diagram illustrating the camera of FIG. 2;

4 is a block diagram illustrating the central control apparatus of FIG. 2.

<Description of the reference numerals for the main parts of the drawings>

10: robot cleaner 11: reducer

12: sensor unit 13: front camera

14: upward camera 15: drive unit

16: Storage 17: Transmitter / Receiver

18: control unit 19: battery

20: battery charge detection unit 30: external charging device

40: remote controller 41: wireless repeater

50: central control unit

In order to achieve the above object, the robot cleaner according to the present invention includes a driving unit for driving a plurality of wheels, a suction unit for sucking dust, and at least one camera installed on a main body to capture an external environment. The camera comprises a fisheye lens for wide-angle imaging.

In addition, the robot cleaner system according to the present invention in order to achieve the above object is a robot having a drive unit for driving a plurality of wheels, a suction unit for sucking dust, at least one camera installed on the main body to capture the external environment A robot cleaner system having a cleaner and a remote controller in wireless communication with the robot cleaner, wherein the camera includes a fisheye lens for wide-angle imaging.

Hereinafter, a robot cleaner and a system thereof according to a preferred embodiment of the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the accompanying drawings.

1 is a perspective view schematically showing an appearance of a robot cleaner according to the present invention, and FIG. 2 is a block diagram illustrating a robot cleaner system to which the robot cleaner of FIG. 1 is applied.

Referring to the drawings, the robot cleaner 10 includes a suction unit 11, a sensor unit 12, a front camera 13, an upper camera 14, a driving unit 15, a storage device 16, and a transmission / reception unit ( 17), a control unit 18 and a battery 19.

The suction part 11 is provided on the main body 10a so that the dust | flour of the floor which opposes while collecting air may be collected. Such a suction part 11 may be configured by various known methods. As an example, the dust collecting unit 11 includes a suction motor (not shown) and a dust collecting chamber for collecting dust sucked through a suction port or a suction pipe formed to face the floor by driving the suction motor.

The sensor unit 12 transmits a signal to the outside and the obstacle detection sensor 12a disposed at predetermined intervals around the side of the body to receive the reflected signal, and the mileage detection capable of measuring the mileage distance. The sensor 12b is provided.

In the obstacle detection sensor 12a, a plurality of infrared light emitting elements (not shown) emitting infrared rays and light receiving elements (not shown) receiving the reflected light are vertically paired and arranged along the outer circumferential surface thereof. Alternatively, the obstacle detection sensor 12a may emit an ultrasonic wave, and an ultrasonic sensor configured to receive the reflected ultrasonic wave may be applied. The obstacle detecting sensor 12a is also used to measure the distance from the obstacle or the wall.

The traveling distance detection sensor 12b may be a rotation detection sensor for detecting the rotation speed of the wheel 15a. For example, the rotation detection sensor may be an encoder installed to detect the rotation speed of a motor (not shown) for driving the wheel (15a).

The front camera 13 is installed on the main body 10a so as to capture the front image and outputs the captured image to the controller 18.

The upper camera 14 is provided on the main body 10a so as to capture an image from above, and outputs the captured image to the control unit 18.

3, the upper camera 14 includes a fisheye lens 14a, a solid state imaging element (CCD) 14b, and an A / D converter 14c. The fisheye lens 14a is composed of at least one lens designed such that the imaging viewing angle can be provided as wide as fish eyes, for example, up to about 180 degrees. The fisheye lens 14a is suitably designed to suit the desired viewing angle range or allowable distortion amount. Fisheye lens structures are disclosed in Korean Patent Publication No. 1996-7005245, Korean Patent Publication No. 1997-48669, Korean Patent Publication No. 1994-22112, etc., and are commercially available from various lens manufacturers, and thus detailed description thereof will be omitted.

Of course, the fisheye lens 13a may be applied to the front camera 13.

The driving unit 15 drives the wheel 15a according to the control signal of the controller 18.

The transmitter / receiver 17 transmits the data to be transmitted through the antenna 17a and transmits the signal received through the antenna 17a to the controller 18.

The battery 19 is installed on the main body 10a to be charged through a battery charging power supply terminal (not shown) installed outside the main body 10a so as to be coupled to and detachable from the external charging device 30.

The battery charge detection unit 20 detects the charge of the battery 19 and generates a charge request signal when the detected charge reaches the set lower limit level.

The controller 18 processes the signal received through the transmitter / receiver 17 and controls each element. When a key input device (not shown) is further provided on the main body 10a in which a plurality of keys are provided for manipulating the function setting of the device, the controller 18 processes the key signal input from the key input device.

Hereinafter, an example of recognizing a position by using the image captured by the upper camera 14 and moving to a target position will be described.

The controller 18 controls each element to wait while charging in a coupled state with the external charging device 30 during the non-working.

The controller 18 receives the work instruction signal to efficiently return to the external charging device 30 after the work is performed, and the charging device captured by the upper camera 14 in the state coupled to the external charging device 30. The upper image is stored in the storage device 16.

When the controller 18 completes the operation indicated therein or receives a charge request signal from the battery charge detector 20 during the operation, the controller 18 acquires the upper image information corresponding to the stored charging device position and the current upper camera 14. The driving unit 15 is controlled to return to the external charging device 30 by tracking the position of the external charging device 30 by comparing the images.

That is, the controller 18 compares the image above the charging device 30 and the current upper image stored in the return mode to the external charging device 30 to recognize the distance and the direction separated from the charging device 30. The drive unit 15 is controlled to return to the desired charging device position from the recognized current position. Here, the work request signal includes a cleaning operation or a monitoring operation through the cameras 12 and 14.

In the position recognition process by the image comparison process, the image information of the space corresponding to the wide viewing angle of the fisheye lens 14a can be acquired, so that the identification of the desired moving position or the current position can be performed more quickly and easily.

On the other hand, in this image comparison process, since the image captured by the fisheye lens 14a is provided distorted as if the real spatial information is mapped to the surface of the hemisphere, the image is corrected in a linear shape corresponding to the real spatial information. It is preferable that the image correction unit (not shown) is provided in the storage device 16 so that it can be executed by the control unit 18 or the control unit 18. Here, the image corrector is configured to process the image distorted in the hemispherical shape into a linear shape in a planar shape, and various methods are known. For example, as disclosed in Korean Patent No. 163915, there is a method of compensating by applying an inverse weight value corresponding to the distortion rate of a fisheye lens to a received image, and various methods for compensating the distortion rate are known.

In the above description, the example in which the control unit 18 recognizes the position using the image captured by the upper camera 14 has been described.

According to another aspect of the present invention, the robot cleaner system is constructed to externally process the control of the robot cleaner to reduce the computational burden on the image processing of the robot cleaner 10.

To this end, the robot cleaner 10 is configured to wirelessly transmit the upper image captured by the upper camera 14 to the outside, and operate according to a control signal received from the outside, and the remote controller 40 controls the operation and charging. A series of controls, including return to device 30, control the robot cleaner 10 wirelessly.

The remote controller 40 includes a wireless repeater 41 and a central controller 50.

The wireless repeater 41 processes the radio signal received from the robot cleaner 10 and transmits the radio signal to the central controller 50 through a wire, and wirelessly transmits the signal received from the central controller 50 through the antenna 42. Is sent to the robot cleaner 41.

The central control unit 50 is constructed of a conventional computer, an example of which is shown in FIG. Referring to the drawings, the central control unit 50 includes a central processing unit (CPU) 51, a ROM 52, a RAM 53, a display unit 54, an input unit 55, The storage device 56 and the communication device 57 are provided.

The storage device 56 is provided with a robot cleaner driver 56a that controls the robot cleaner 10 and processes a signal transmitted from the robot cleaner 10.

When executed, the robot cleaner driver 56a provides a menu for setting the control of the robot cleaner 10 through the display device 54 and processes the menu item selected by the user for the provided menu to be executed by the robot cleaner. do. Preferably, the menu includes a cleaning operation and a monitoring operation as a large category, and a plurality of menus that can be supported by a device to be applied, such as a work target area selection list and a work method, are provided as a sub selection menu for the large category.

The robot cleaner driver 56a includes an image corrector 56b for correcting the distorted image captured by the fisheye lenses 14a and 13a, and the controller 18 controls the image captured by the upper camera 14. It can be constructed to transmit as it is without correction.

When the robot cleaner driver 56a receives a work instruction signal through the input device 55 by the set work timing or by the user, the robot cleaner driver 56a is first coupled to the charging device 30 to wait for the upper camera 14 of the robot cleaner 10 to be waiting. The charging device upper image photographed by the robot cleaner 10 is received from the robot cleaner 10, and the received charging device 30 upper image is stored in the storage device 56. Thereafter, the robot cleaner driver 56a controls the robot cleaner 10 so that the indicated work can be performed. The control unit 18 of the robot cleaner 10 controls the driving unit 15 and / or the dust collecting unit 11 according to the control information received from the robot cleaner driver 56a through the wireless repeater 41, and is currently the upper camera. The upward image picked up by 14 is transmitted to the central controller 50 via the wireless repeater 41.

When the battery charge request signal or the work completion signal is received from the robot cleaner during the job control through the wireless repeater 41, the robot cleaner driver 56a may have upward image information corresponding to the location of the charger stored in the storage device 56. The robot cleaner 10 is controlled to return to the external charging device 30 by tracking the position of the external charging device 30 by comparing the image acquired by the current upper camera 14 with the received image.

As described so far, according to the robot cleaner and the system according to the present invention, the camera employing the wide-angle fisheye lens is mounted, so that image information can be acquired at a wide viewing angle with respect to the surrounding area, and thus the position recognition process is performed. It becomes easier.

Claims (2)

In the robot cleaner having a drive unit for driving a plurality of wheels, a dust suction unit for sucking dust and at least one camera mounted on the main body to capture the external environment, The camera is a robot cleaner, characterized in that having a wide-angle imaging fisheye lens. A robot cleaner having a drive unit for driving a plurality of wheels, a suction unit for sucking dust, a robot cleaner having at least one camera mounted on a main body to capture an external environment, and a remote controller for wireless communication with the robot cleaner. In the system, The camera is a robot cleaner system characterized in that it comprises a fisheye lens for wide-angle imaging.