Third Generation Experimental Vehicle DARVIN

Side View	Interior	Engine Compartment	Computers

The Name

DARVIN is a short term for

Driver
Assistance using
Realtime
Vision for
INnercity areas

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Applications

DARVIN represents the third generation experimental platform for machine-vision-based road vehicle control. Its equipment has been designed for the development end experimental verification of algorithmic driver assistance in urban traffic. The project is funded by the Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft and managed by Prof. Nagel.

• Model based intersection tracking
• Model based vehicle tracking
• Traffic situation analysis and conceptual description
• Driver assistance by spoken recommendations and supporting vehicle control
• Support for handicapped drivers

A more detailed project description is available in english and in german.

Results on vision-based driver assistance based on automatically generated intersection models have been presented at the Intelligent Vehicles Symposium 2000 in Dearborn/MI.

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Computer Control of

• Hydraulic steering system
• Brake system
• Throttle system
• Gear change system
• Light, blink signal control

These systems can be operated by the computer and manual operation by the driver can be detected.

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Equipment

• Vehicle: Volkswagen Passat Variant GL (1996)
• Computers:
• 2 x Dual-PentiumII-300Mhz
• 2 x PentiumI-233MHz
• Flat TFT Monitor
• Fast Ethernet coupled
• Stereo CCD-Camera setup
• Steering angle sensor
• GMR (magneto-resistive) wheel sensors

The equipment was mainly installed by Haag Rehatechnik, Östringen.The GMR sensors were kindly donated by Robert Bosch GmbH. 

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Related Publications

• F. Heimes, K. Fleischer, H.-H. Nagel: Automatic Generation of Intersection Models from Digital Maps for Vision-Based Driving on Innercity Intersections. In Proc. IEEE Intelligent Vehicles Symposium, 3. - 5. Oktober 2000, Dearborn/MI, pp. 498 - 503.
• F. Heimes: Sichtsystemgestützte Fahrerassistenz im innerstädtischen Straßenverkehr. Dissertation, computer science department, university of Karlsruhe, July 2000; published in "Dissertationen zur Künstlichen Intelligenz (DISKI)" 243, Infix-Verlag, St. Augustin, 2000, ISBN 3-89838-243-5.
• H.-H. Nagel, F. Heimes, K. Fleischer, M. Haag, H. Leuck, S. Noltemeier: Quantitative Comparison between Trajectory Estimates Obtained from a Binocular Camera Setup within a Moving Road Vehicle and from the Outside by a Stationary Monocular Camera. Special Issue: Applications of Computer Vision to Intelligent Vehicles; Image and Vision Computing 18:5 (2000) 435 - 444.
• H.-H. Nagel, F. Heimes, S. Noltemeier, M. Haag: Quantitative Comparison between Trajectory Estimates Obtained from a Binocular Camera Setup within a Moving Road Vehicle and from the Outside by a Stationary Monocular Camera. In Proc. Intelligent Vehicles Symposium, 28. - 30. Oktober 1998, Stuttgart, pp. 423 - 429.
• F. Heimes, H.-H. Nagel: Real-Time Tracking of Intersections in Image Sequences of a Moving Camera. In A. Broggi (Ed.): Special Issue on Machine Vision for Intelligent Vehicles and Autonomous Robots; Int. Journal of Engineering Applications of Artificial Intelligence (EAAI), 11 (1998) 215 - 227.
• F. Heimes, H.-H. Nagel, T. Frank: Model-Based Tracking of Complex Innercity Road Intersections. In Amin et al. (Eds.): Special Issue on Intelligent Transportation Systems - Traffic Sensing and Management; Mathematical and Computer Modelling 27:9 - 11 (1998) 189 - 203.
• M. Tonko, K. Schäfer, F. Heimes, H.-H. Nagel: Towards Visually Servoed Manipulation of Car Engine Parts. In R. W. Harrigan (Ed.): Proc. IEEE Int. Conf. on Robotics and Automation, Albuquerque/NM, 20. - 25. April 1997, IEEE Computer Society Press, Los Alamitos/CA, 1997, pp. 3166 - 3171.
• F. Heimes: Sichtsystemgestützte Erkennung von Straßenverkehrsszenen. Diploma thesis, Institut für Algorithmen und Kognitive Systeme, computer science department, university of Karlsruhe, August 1995; carried out at the Fraunhofer-Institut für Informations- und Datenverarbeitung (IITB), Karlsruhe.
• V. Gengenbach, H.-H. Nagel, F. Heimes, G. Struck, H. Kollnig: Model-Based Recognition of Intersections and Lane Structures. In Proc. Intelligent Vehicles ´95 Symposium, 25. - 26. September 1995, Detroit/MI, pp. 512 - 517.

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Contact

• Dr.-Ing. Frank Heimes,
• Prof. Dr. Hans-Hellmut Nagel, +49 (0) 721 / 608-4323, nagel@ira.uka.de
• Klaus Fleischer

Fraunhofer-Institut für
Informations- und Datenverarbeitung (IITB)
Fraunhoferstr. 1
76131 Karlsruhe/Germany

Telefax: +49 (0) 721 / 6091-413

• Haag Rehatechnik, +49 (0) 7253 / 24279, Haag-Rehatechnik@t-online.de

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