Hands-on with the Pixy2 vision system via Embedded Computing Design

I love how the Arduino world just keeps growing and growing — and component size keeps shrinking and shrinking — and bringing what used to be high-end pricy features to low price electronics. — Douglas

While you undoubtedly have some familiarity with computer vision (CV), normally these systems come packaged as either an expensive industrial setup, or as something powered by your phone or an actual computer – not something that’s set up for experimentation with small robots and boards made by the likes of Arduino, Raspberry Pi, and BeagleBoard.

Pixy, the result of a collaboration between Carnegie Melon Robotics Institute and Charmed Labs, changed this in 2014 as a vision system bridging the gap between those two worlds. The originals can still be purchased for around $70, but as of late May 2018, they debuted a new device, that’s “smaller, faster, and [surprisingly] lower cost.” The aptly-named Pixy2 still tracks differently-colored objects, but ads line-following algorithms, and can even interpret simple bar codes. It also features a pair of LEDs to illuminate where it’s looking.

Read Hands-on with the Pixy2 vision system via Embedded Computing Design

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