Machine Vision, 3rd Edition

CHAPTER 20 Egomotion and Related Tasks

20.1 Introduction

Mechatronics is the study of mechanisms and the electronic systems that are needed to provide them with intelligent control. It has applications in a wide variety of areas, including industry, commerce, transport, space, and even the health service. For instance, robots can be used in principle–and often in practice–for mowing lawns, clearing rubbish, driving vehicles, effecting bomb disposal, carrying out reconnaissance, performing delicate operations, and executing automatic assembly tasks. A related task is that of automated inspection for quality control, though in that case the robots take the form of trapdoors or air jets that divert defective items into reject bins (Chapter 22 ...