Posted by student on January 20, 2004 at 20:57:56:
In Reply to: UAV developers in denail of history posted by Melbourne RPV on January 08, 2004 at 01:45:15:
RC sized uav is cool :)
diy uav is cooler.
I would suggest that a few generations of technology and miniaturisation are needed such that vision recognition systems can be usefully implemented in a model plane sized uav. Until
this happens (guess 5-10 years) I consider uav's to be effectively flying blind. This does not mean that they should not be able to safely fly over an urban area. My opinion is that
recognition of ground objects are out of the question without specified data sent or prerecorded to the uav is not realistic. This also applies to all other aircraft and birds for that matter.
A uav could be used for aerial photography automation. Which would be cool from an environmental research perspective. Day to day coverage of a region would become possible for peanuts of the cost of current technology. Read possible and useful today.
"We have UAV's in plenty now." Not small ones. We have these things called computers and compared to 1980 they rock. This means that we can make them make decisions. I suggest a use will be
found and the fact that I can be building one in my back yard means that there is something changing in the field which will be just as important as being able to fly at all.
/end rant.