NEW LIFE, NEW CHALLENGES

In Tsukuba University's CVLAB are researching about the application of Mutual Subspace Methods and its derivates to solving several Computer Vision problems. For many of the methods, information coming from multiple points of view (multiple cameras or a camera in different positions) of an object is used.

For example, in this work: "Face recognition using multi-viewpoint patterns for robot vision" a face recognition system using multi-viewpoint images is developed. A still camera is used in this work, so in order to acquire multi-viewpoint images of the user's face the user should move around the camera and change the pose of his face.

The challenge for me is to develop a robot capable of moving a camera in order to get multi-viewpoint images of a target, it doesn't matter if it is a face, an apple or whatever. But, in the case of face recognition, the user doesn't need to move his face around the camera, the robot moves the camera around the user's face. So the user can go on with his life undisturbed :p)

To undertake this challenge first I must build a simulation of the robot and later when the simulations give good results build the actual robot. So I am going to start building the simulation using Microsoft Robotics Developer Studio

This is so exciting! I will keep posting as the project goes on.

SETTLED IN TSUKUBA

Well, it has been almost one week since my wife and I arrived to Japan. We are almost settled so I would like to talk a little bit about the city we are living in: Tsukuba

Tsukuba's flag

The city is known for the location of Tsukuba Science City. A planned city developed around 1960. Inside the "research world" it is usually referred as "the researcher's paradise" and so far it is a more than deserved name. This city has everything a researcher could ever need: research institutions, nice environment and a lot of peaceful places to find inspiration.

This city has a population of about 200.000 inhabitants and I've heard that about 5% of them have a PhD. 

When I have time I will upload more pictures but for now you can see this, it is on my way to the laboratory:

A space rocket! How cool is that? xD

LEAVING FOR TSUKUBA, JAPAN

Dear friends, 

Next Tuesday I leave my home town again to go back to Japan. This time I will join the University of Tsukuba Computer Vision Laboratory to research about topics related with computer vision applied to robotics under the framework of monbukagakusho scholarship.

I will keep you informed about the new challenges found on the way :)