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  • Author Author: Problemchild
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The astounding athletic power of quadcopters

Problemchild

Found this nice little video on the TED channel of da 'Tube.  Raffaello D'Andrea demonstrating the abilities of

Quadracopters balancing,carrying,catching & throwing both as individuals and as an organised unit.

Eventually he lets the magic slip when he shows the host of operators and computer systems driving the

Whirling Dervishes.

  • in reply to peteroakes

    I agree Peter the whole thing has been pre-worked out and the operators switch from one mode to another.

    This is the best way of keeping his algorithmic "magic" looking like magic

  • in reply to shabaz

    I do remember this been mentioned on the Edinburgh Hackerspace List last year.

    Although he says he designs algorithms he tend to glance over them as "magic" .

     

    The marker scheme is interesting reference for any such  device as well ..not bad

    It's a good way of raising interest to non experts

  • Actually, this may be a shortened version but when I watched this a year or so ago, i was pretty sure he did mention the system used extensive back end computers doing all the math required to calculate the movement to catch the flying balls etc.  it is an awesome demo of what can be done with a bit (Lot) of processing power and a seemingly meshed set of drones

     

    if you have not watched this video yet, you should. there is no way an operator or set of operators could perform those stunts without extensive reliance on the computers taking the real control. I would imagine any operators are simply turning on and off drones as needed for the various demos

  • I've watched 5 minutes of this, and it's now on my to-be-watched again!! list.

    Although it's a very controlled environment (indoors, maybe people on standby to ensure algorithms can be overidden, etc) nevertheless it was still extremely impressive to watch. Truly astounding. It was like watching the david copperfield of the quadcopter world.