Maveric UAV in the news

[Jason Grzywna]

A new player in the small, high-tech UAV space. Maveric uses on-board computer vision processing, is small enough to be hand launched, and can fly for up to 90 minutes.

http://digg.com/gadgets/Maveric_UAV_Small_Smart_Sexy

Also, check out the blog here:
http://mavericuav.blogspot.com/

[CenTexFlyer]

Saw it in Yuma during Golden Phoenix but it didn't fly. Nice plane, very well done. One of the problems with organic wings tho, is they don't hold up well in high winds. On the Mt. Hood rescue effort we saw TacMav fold up 8 times in the wind, same type of wing. The media also got it wrong again in stating it was the first "man packable, man operable" UAV to be developed as well, but that's pretty much standard as well.

[Gary Mortimer]

It does win lots of points for looking good.

Fetch the Bat Mav Robin, Nah na Nah na Nah na Nah na nat Nahhhh

[CenTexFlyer]

LOL didn't even think of that till you brought it up :) :)

[Pack AE]

One of the problems with organic wings tho, is they don't hold up well in high winds. On the Mt. Hood rescue effort we saw TacMav fold up 8 times in the wind, same type of wing.

Of course, the term "high winds" is extremely relative. They were trying to fly the Nighthawk (redesigned version of the TACMAV, bit larger) in hurricane force winds at Hood... winds they weren't even trying to fly a C-130 in... an attempt that was probably fairly ridiculous in hindsight, but the intention was good.

These types of wings are actually surprisingly good in winds, particularly the version used on Maveric. You'll find that such wings will provide some natural dampening in windy conditions, making the aircraft more stable than a solid wing version would be.

But regardless of your wing design, if you're trying to fly in winds that are 3-4 times your airspeed (as was the case at Hood), it doesn't take much of a gust to flip the plane over and swat it out of the sky. It's too bad the Maveric wasn't in existence at the time of the Hood rescue effort, as its top airspeed is much higher than the Nighthawk's, meaning that it might have actually had a prayer in trying to penetrate those winds.

[CenTexFlyer]

We were there.....it was not fun.

[clolson]

What wind speeds were you seeing?

[Jack Crossfire]

If you're wondering why Sloan's blog sounds a bit clueless, he's in
Gainesville. That area is how shall we say, not the most educated.
However he's making a ton of money on the hobby, so he's got the skillz
that count.

U really have to make dumb algorithms sound like rocket science to make
money. It's not the "technology". It's how you sell the "technology".

He's obviously a spinoff of the University of Fl*rida MAV group. But U
know, these vehicles are all too big compared to what people need &
that's where Prox Dynamics comes in.

[Pack AE]

Wow Jack, that hurts. I've always enjoyed following your blog... guess it's time to part ways.

FYI... I have no real personal connection with the UF MAV Group, but I've hung around with a few of those guys. Good people. I do proudly live in Alachua (near Gainesville), and I do proudly believe that the Maveric UAS is the most technologically advanced small UAV product on the market. Would love to see evidence otherwise.

-- Adam Sloan

[Jack Crossfire]

Scavenging what's available on the website, it is sort of remarkable that what's being done in unemployed red neck hick headquarters Gainesville is more advanced than anything being done in Silicon Valley. Did you know that the state of the art in Silicon Valley was obsolete when Amir Rubin was still an undergrad?

We're still founding the same startups on the dot coms & home networking that we were in 2000 while Gainesville is doing the machine vision & autonomous systems. In ascending levels of technology there's Silicon Valley startups followed by UAV hobbyists, followed by UAV startups, followed by foreign UAV startups.

No. I don't take most of the American UAV startups seriously. The stuff that hobbyists & foreign countries are doing is downright freakish.

[Gary Mortimer]

http://www.proxdynamics.com/

[Pack AE]

I don't take issue with anything you've said regarding Silicon Valley, although calling Gainesville a "red neck hick headquarters" is ironic on so many levels.

We welcome the foreign competition. Please do shoot me some links showing some of the freakish things that are going on in the hobby world and outside of our borders.

BTW, I think Prox's stuff is amazing... I have a micro mosquito sitting in my office. There's a mission for a Black Hornet and a mission for a Maveric, as there is for a Blackhawk and an F-15.

[Jack Crossfire]

The camera doesn't lie. This was what we saw during the last trip to Gainesville. If it really was high tech utopia, our property would be worth billions.

[Pack AE]

Funny, I just saw a couple of guys that looked just like that in Paso Robles the other day.

Good luck in all that you do, Jack. Please do give us a digg on the story above if you've got the time.

[CenTexFlyer]

Woof! Does six years in the UA business still make me a startup?

MOMMY!

:)

Gene

[Pack AE]

bttt... come on UAVers, we need diggs!

[Gary Mortimer]

No you don't you need Tweets, Digg is dug

[patrickegan]

centex,

Too bad you just got hitched cause that Jordan Smith throws a mean UA. A sun dress @ golden phoenix could have translated into a multi-million dollar contract. :D When marketing product it pays to use your ass-ets

[Jason Grzywna]

No you don't you need Tweets, Digg is dug

Twitter you say?

http://twitter.com/MavericUAV

or how about YouTube?

http://www.youtube.com/user/PrioriaMAV

[rbeall]

Thanks BYU!

[Jack Crossfire]

The obstacle avoidance demo isn't as crazy as the BYU demo, but the BYU object tracking & stabilization was an LA job. Nowadays it's all done by hobbyists. The onboard image stabilization has a bit of work left.

[Gary Mortimer]

Tis done Jason

The 1-2-3 launch system is good, is it included with all of them??

[Pack AE]

delete

[patrickegan]

Just wait for the AUVSI show and steal some ideas. That's how everyone else does R&D :D

[fireisborn]

Wow Jack,

All that crashing of helicopter kludges got you in a cranky mood?

I'd say being payed for doing what you love beats being a "flat broke, low paid programmer"

Do I sense some Jealousy....



If you're wondering why Sloan's blog sounds a bit clueless, he's in
Gainesville. That area is how shall we say, not the most educated.
However he's making a ton of money on the hobby, so he's got the skillz
that count.

U really have to make dumb algorithms sound like rocket science to make
money. It's not the "technology". It's how you sell the "technology".

He's obviously a spinoff of the University of Fl*rida MAV group. But U
know, these vehicles are all too big compared to what people need &
that's where Prox Dynamics comes in.

[Jack Crossfire]

Wacky rotory wing airframe designs R definitely off limits. The Procerus touch has gotten around & influenced the hobby in many ways. No-one questions uBlox 5 is the best $100 module ever, but how do U think we learned that?

U might be surprised to find reporting to superiors to do your hobby isn't entirely a free lunch. Building crazy ideas & making money don't go well together.

[Pack AE]

Just wait for the AUVSI show and steal some ideas. That's how everyone else does R&D :D

Ah, but this revolutionary grassroots hobby technology I keep hearing about isn't shown at AUVSI... that's what I'm looking for... and not to steal

[patrickegan]

A vendor with a heart :) How do you expect to land a 20 million dollar contract with that attitude? :D

[Jack Crossfire]

> Ah, but this revolutionary grassroots hobby technology I keep hearing about isn't shown at AUVSI

Stop being an a-hole, Adam. The law of averages says if people do something in their hobby, the state of the art must be much more advanced. People do your product as a hobby. That's our point. Suck it up & get back to work.

[dmgoedde]

INNOVATIVE IMU-based autopilot technology (examples: extraordinarily small form factor, extraordinarily high processing power, implementation of advanced control techniques, etc)
So let's say there is an upcoming IMU autopilot that is 1 x 1.25 x 0.5" and 5 grams sans GPS... could that fit the bill?

[Pack AE]

Jack, I gotta be honest... I'm totally confused. First you tell me that hobby technology is as good as (or better than) what we're advertising, then you imply that what we're advertising is much more advanced than hobby technology.

I'm not trying to be an a-hole. I'm dead serious. If you have something or know of something that fits my interests above, I want to know about it. I want to work with you on it. I want to make some money for you in the process.

We know there are plenty of people out there who are doing this stuff as a hobby... I don't have the time to keep up with all of it. But the bottom line is that engineers who do this as a hobby are still engineering... you won't get me to argue that engineers who are paid to do this stuff are doing anything more ground-breaking than engineers who are doing it for fun. I honestly don't believe that. But I do want people to realize that we're open to working with anyone that can offer technology that meshes with our vision of the future of UAVs, plain and simple. No BS.

[hg1]

I'll try to translate ...

There's nothing new here - at least for sensor / robotics / aviation, NASA or DOD would fund the initial technology development, and more often than not, someone in his/her garage would figure out how to repurpose the technology in a more cost effective way. It used to be that would lead to a business plan and venture funding, but that's not happening a lot anymore, at least in the US, and the US Govt hardly retains an exclusive franchise on funding basic research. Given that most of the core sensor and processor components we use are fabricated elsewhere (China, Singapore, Korea, sometimes Japan, etc), it means that we're mostly just system integrators and marketing packagers. That's not to say that original work isn't being done, but you probably aren't reading about it here.

[patrickegan]

Not unless you can read Chinese...

[Pack AE]

I don't know... we get an awful lot of interest out of Asian countries... which makes it hard for me to believe that they're more advanced in the small UAV arena. IMHO, the US is 5-10 years ahead of the rest of the world (minus maybe Israel) in micro autopilot development.

Regardless, at this point I can still believe that there are people out there in their garages doing amazing things... even though Jack apparently doesn't like me, he's a great example... so the offer stands. You guys can find my contact info on the previous page... drop us a line.

[patrickegan]

I think it's the software :)

[hg1]

I haven't seen any garage operations (or the commercial enterprises that follow) building one of these yet -

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wRuQus37Agk

[airmcn_3]

I haven't seen any garage operations (or the commercial enterprises that follow) building one of these yet -

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wRuQus37Agk


Thats one of the coolest things I have ever seen.

[Pack AE]

Ha, me neither, but that's not at all what I'm looking for... that looks like something that would be great if your purpose is to perform reconnaissance for 30 seconds and let everyone within half a mile know where you are. To each his own I guess.

[airmcn_3]

Ha, me neither, but that's not at all what I'm looking for... that looks like something that would be great if your purpose is to perform reconnaissance for 30 seconds and let everyone within half a mile know where you are. To each his own I guess.


Call it a hunch but I would bet the research of that little jewel is for something more like a mars mission.

EDIT:

I stand corrected. "Meant to be used in a bundle of missile interceptors deployed by a larger "carrier"

Balistic missle technology...........

[fly_boy99]

"Innovation happens elsewhere"
Bill Joy

If you think folks in their garages are willing to just drop what they are doing and contact you to make money....... I think Patrick might have a better chance of making a dime before you. :p

[patrickegan]

I have to disqualify myself as I already do. ;)

[bmw330i]

I haven't seen any garage operations (or the commercial enterprises that follow) building one of these yet -

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wRuQus37Agk

...looks like AttoPilot 2.0 to me.

[Jack Crossfire]

Blindly assuming you're the best of the best & whenever anyone says "the state of the art must be much more advanced" they're talking about U is why U lose war after war after war. Look at this.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g2ovFGFiy0E

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yVvDhAwIbfQ

That's what most of us think of when we think of image stabilization & UAV surveillance. In fact, you have to think the Iranians are a step ahead of it because that was just what hobbyists threw together at their day jobs when their bosses weren't looking. Now look at this.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZhfJNcxn2Vg

Look. It may be embedded software, this & that, maybe you compiled it with mipsel-linux-gcc instead of plain old gcc, but only a primadonna would ever try to sell a product on that kind of footage.

[Pack AE]

And comparing apples to oranges in trying to make a point is a risky mode of operation in any argument, Jack. Your argument might make sense if either of your example videos came from a hand-launched fixed wing UAV. Your timelapse video is great, but I assume you generated it from one of your rotary wing vehicles.

Once again, there are missions for helicopters and there are missions for Maverics and there are missions for Predators and there are missions for satellites. Each platform has strengths and weaknesses.

So yeah, I think the Maveric is the best of the best when it comes to man-packable, hand-launched, fixed wing UAVs. Still waiting for evidence otherwise.

But I can see that regardless of what I have to say, you're determined to disagree. That's cool. I'll spare the rest of the forum from our circular debate by signing off now. Once again, good luck in all that you do.

[Jack Crossfire]

> what hobbyists threw together at their day jobs when their bosses weren't looking.

Ironically the day job is writing DVR implementations for embedded systems, which got us thinking if there was ever a banal, braindead, obsolete, day job that someone did to make money in the UAV business it would have to be our day job, so we searched for UAV DVR & there was MavericUAV's killer application for 2009!

We goofed off from writing the Maveric's killer application to work on crazy UAV concepts. It's probably even implemented on Broadcom 7400's running uClibc hardware floating point. That really shows how when you go from doing something for a hobby to making money on it, it really turns back into your day job.

Probably some of our old bosses are there too.

[hg1]

This is a UAV from Kazakhstan ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kazakhstan ) that is doing stuff with motion tracking and stabilization, though I didn't see it referenced. I read somewhere yesterday that 45 countries had active military UAV programs underway, but somehow I suspect that number is low ...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YxxUMOGrInk

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tczE4GrvaE4

http://kadar.ucoz.ru/_nw/0/81015.jpg

source: http://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1056323

[small_rcer]

I watched all three videos and when I watched the Maverick one I kept waiting for the video stabilization to kick in. In the version I watched the video stabilization never did kick in.

I wonder what it looks like when it does do stabilization. Could the poster post a link to the video with stabilization turned on so we can see the difference.

Thanks

Jim H

[Pack AE]

I watched all three videos and when I watched the Maverick one I kept waiting for the video stabilization to kick in. In the version I watched the video stabilization never did kick in.

I wonder what it looks like when it does do stabilization. Could the poster post a link to the video with stabilization turned on so we can see the difference.

Thanks

Jim H


Jim --

It's important to keep a firm dividing line in your mind between vision processing that is done post-mission or in near-realtime on a laptop (ground-based), and vision processing that is done in realtime using a small embedded processor (onboard).

What is shown in Jack's two example videos is ground-based. If you prefer that type of video stabilization, we do that too...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YcXx6R4VcCc

This is all great (and extremely useful in a lot of scenarios), but there are inherent disadvantages in relying on a ground-based processor for any vision processing tasks.

The Maveric stabilization video that Jack posted...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZhfJNcxn2Vg
... is an example of the stabilization task being done onboard. One thing to keep in mind here is that this video was recorded in gusty conditions with sustained winds of 20-25 knots. Stabilization is active throughout the video, which is why you see the black bars moving in and out of the frame. The black bars are a result of the frame being moved to compensate for vehicle motion. This certainly doesn't look "as good" as a mosaiced ground-based process would look, but it looks significantly better than what the unstabilized video would look like. I would go so far as to say that it looks better than the video you would get from any current small UAV product (defined here as one-man packable, fixed wing or VTOL) flying in similar conditions. And it cuts out the disadvantages of a ground-based vision processor. All on an aircraft that weighs 2.5 lbs, has a maximum dimension of 30", and fits (fully assembled) into a six-inch tube for easy transport.

Feel free to read more about this feature (and others) at http://mavericuav.blogspot.com

[Pack AE]

delete

[hg1]

These products are actually from BlueBird Aero Sytems, which is an Israeli company...That's good to know.

[Michael_UAV]

although I don't believe for a second that they recorded that highway-speed video with that parafoil UAV)

I've been to the Blue-Bird facility and have flown two of their aircraft (SkyLite B and MicroB.) That video was recorded from the Blue-Eye. :)

-Michael

[Soulglow]

Blindly assuming you're the best of the best & whenever anyone says "the state of the art must be much more advanced" they're talking about U is why U lose war after war after war. Look at this.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g2ovFGFiy0E

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yVvDhAwIbfQ

That's what most of us think of when we think of image stabilization & UAV surveillance. In fact, you have to think the Iranians are a step ahead of it because that was just what hobbyists threw together at their day jobs when their bosses weren't looking. Now look at this.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZhfJNcxn2Vg

Look. It may be embedded software, this & that, maybe you compiled it with mipsel-linux-gcc instead of plain old gcc, but only a primadonna would ever try to sell a product on that kind of footage.


Hi all.

I' m a total noob on this thread, but, Jack.....what's your point in showing videos that have been (evidently) stabilised on a computer with, probably, somethin like "VirtualDub" program, and "Deshaker" plugin ( very badly configured by-the-way)...... and pretending those are "onboard stabilised"... :confused:

Or, maybe you've been fooled because you dont know the difference.

Ones can make very impressives videos by post-processing them...it's another story to stabilise it ONBOARD in real time !

Cheers

Alain.