Research and development of open-source UAV systems since 2003
Here is an interesting presentation showing the capabilities of the Paparazzi UAV flight plan system and new Slicer micro fixed wing platform. The strengths of the distributed agent ground control station, and some history of the Paparazzi autopilot hardware. As well as more interesting capabilities and solutions in the Paparazzi UAV framework. Presentation by Pascal Brisset, M. Bronz, M. Gorraz and J. Tyler of ENAC.
From the 24C3 conference, Paparazzi aircraft operated in Hildesheim, Germany and in Castagnac, France were remote controlled in real time by Martin and Antoine (the station in Istanbul, Turkey was lacking a security pilot). The three local ground control stations and the remote one in Berlin were connected to a central server (located in Germany). Video from the 2 aircraft was also visible from the conference room in real-time. It was the result of great team work and … a lot of fun. See media section for some press coverage. The session video is available as a torrent here in Matroska or MPEG-4 format and these are the presentation slides.
MAV 07 was yet another great success for the project! Paparazzi teams took 1st, 3rd, 4th, and 5th places in the outdoor autonomous surveillance competition and were honored to share the 1st place award with the very well designed Micropilot-equipped 48cm Ping Wing from Linköping University in Sweden.
The first Paparazzi helicopter, Twisted Logic proved that a passively stable helicopter could operate well in mild outdoor winds and also took 2nd place in the indoor competition, surpassed only by the “Father of passively stable helicopters”, world famous Petter Muren of Proxflyer and BladeRunner fame.
The team of Christian Lindenberg and (fake) Martin Müller also won the special award from the jury for it general performance and fair spirit.
MAV 07 will be held in Toulouse, France (of course!) September 17-21, 2007. Expect to see lots of great Paparazzi systems kicking ass and taking names!
Dr. Paul MacCready, legendary aeronautical engineer and founder of Aerovironment, died in his sleep at the age of 81. Many of us met him met him in 2005 at MAV05 in Germany but all of us are familiar with his incredible body of work ranging from the first human powered aircraft, to the GM Sunraycer electric car, and the world altitude record holding Helios. MacCready was a world champion sailplane pilot, holds a Cal Tech Ph.D. in aeronautics, has been granted 7 honorary degrees, and has contributed a total of 4 aircraft and one car to the permanent collection of the Smithsonian Institution. He founded Aerovironment in 1971, the world’s largest supplier of hand-launched UAVs.
Three Paparazzi equipped Funjets were part of the Flohof measurement campaign around the Hofsjökull glacier in Iceland. We were able to measure temperature, humidity, pressure and estimate the wind. The authorities issued a NOTAM, clearing the airspace up to 12.000 feet which allowed us to set a new Paparazzi altitude record.
The sun is finally back. We took all of these babies for multiple aircraft flights. From left to right : 600g minimag, 900g twinjet, 600g funjet and 350g microjet. It’s such a shame that multiplex stoped producing microjets….. they didn’t even ask us :(
Two Paparazzi teams, ENAC/Miraterre and Martin Mueller/Christian Lindeberg won 2nd and 3rd place at the MAV06 competition in Sandestin, Florida. Unfortunately, both teams had insufficient video resolution to identify the 1.5m ground target
required for high-scoring and the winning prize went to Bringham Young University who was able to identify 2 of the 3 targets with a Panasonic KX-141 camera and an unusually narrow 30 degree FOV lens. The Bringham Young team used the Procerus Kestrel autopilot (originally developed at the university) and obviously practiced video target recognition much more than the rest of us.
Paparazzi has come a long way since it’s creation in 2003. For a bit of nostalgia browse the original website.
The EMAV06 competition took place in Braunschweig, Germany. All the teams were equipped with Paparazzi. With four Paparazzi teams winning four first places. ENAC took 3rd place in the “Fixed-Wing” category.