lighthouse with 2018/2019 Christmas video

Topics related to the Lighthouse positioning system, configuration and use
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Snidel
Beginner
Posts: 2
Joined: Sat Sep 19, 2020 9:28 am

lighthouse with 2018/2019 Christmas video

Post by Snidel »

Hi all.

I'm impressed with light show using lighthouse on your blog and now trying to reproduce it.
I want to know which functionalities / apis are used in this tutorial.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6q7rZbskd1c

1) At the beginning of the video, what feature does the animation of the drone swinging from side to side use?
https://youtu.be/6q7rZbskd1c?t=13

2) Animation of drawing a circle around a tree with 7 crazyflies.
I think you use `define_trajectory()` and `start_trajectory()` instead of `go_to()`.
What I'm not sure is how to change the color of the drone's LED while drawing the trajectory.
Is this extending the firmware and uploading the LED colors along with the trajectory?
https://youtu.be/6q7rZbskd1c?t=43

We probably have a lot to learn from this program, but are you planning to publish it?
That way, like the other samples, we can get a better understanding for each python api ;)

Regards,
arnaud
Bitcraze
Posts: 2538
Joined: Tue Feb 06, 2007 12:36 pm

Re: lighthouse with 2018/2019 Christmas video

Post by arnaud »

Hi,
The trajectories where made using the CrazyDance software by Ben. The drones where controlled by LaMouchFolle. The firmware used was 'stock'. As far as I can remember (and tell from the code), LaMoucheFolle is sending high-level position GoTo commands at high frequency (~60Hz), this was not the intended use of the goto command but it work well enough. It is also possible to send goto commands a bit less fast but interrupt one goto by another to get nice trajectories.

To answer your questions:

1) GoTo commands that moves the drone left and right 'quickly'

2) Same as above, it was made using high speed goto commands, using trajectories would be more reliable though. When sending real-time commands, the led ring can be controlled by setting parameters. The "fadeColorEffect" is very well suited for this purpose since it allows to set the full color of the ledring using a single parameter set (ie. using a single radio packet), the RGB values are packed in a uint32. However, If you use trajectories, you cannot set the ledring from the trajectory itself yet.

We where planning on publishing the Crazydance file and even to make a making-off video, but then 2020 happened and we did not have time to do it. I will look at recovering and pushing the file somewhere, I can keep this thread updated when I have done it.
Snidel
Beginner
Posts: 2
Joined: Sat Sep 19, 2020 9:28 am

Re: lighthouse with 2018/2019 Christmas video

Post by Snidel »

Hi Arnaud.

I see.
If you have a time, could you share the exported file from CrazyDance with us by email or here?

I tried to make the animation from scratch but it's honestly tough for us. So if you push that file, it would be helpful.

Regards,
benkuper
Beginner
Posts: 2
Joined: Mon Oct 16, 2017 4:05 pm

Re: lighthouse with 2018/2019 Christmas video

Post by benkuper »

Hello Snidel,
I'm the creator of CrazyDance and LaMoucheFolle.

Thank you for your interest !
I want to express some important notes about this whole project :

- Both LaMoucheFolle and CrazyDance are R&D softwares, not finished, likely buggy in many places, and without any documentation :) They have been used for few shows and research projects but mainly for internal use. They are free to use and enjoy but I can't really take too much time providing support for those, also because it's very likely that when I get back to drone-related projects, those softwares will change a lot then.

- Right now, the way CrazyDance and LaMoucheFolle are working is realtime position control of all the drones over the CrazyRadio. There is no exported sequence, and it's not using all the high-level trajectory system. It is a plan in the future to be able to export a more optimized, autonomous sequence that can be played from within the drone, but right now it's only realtime, so you have to launch it from CrazyDance, through LaMoucheFolle.

- I have attached the files for LaMoucheFolle, CrazyDance and Chataigne (I honestly don't remember what is doing the Chataigne file but I attach it here just in case). There are chances that the files are not super compatible or things don't work, I'm sorry in advance for that :)

I hope you will manage to do something about it !

Cheers
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