In the light of various research projects, master thesis students at HAN Automotive Research are working on route/path planning solutions for complex vehicle combinations and support systems using this information. VISTA is one of the projects making use of this advanced path planning technology. Recently, TTM published an article on recent progression made, mentioning VISTA as well. The article can be found here: https://www.ttm.nl/nieuws/slimme-tools-voor-sturen-met-lzvs/129009/
The VISTA VR simulator is now including an integrated loop of VISTA technology. The simulator as demonstrated in December was not yet providing any feedback to the driver as it was mainly focused on visualization performance. This allowed an immersive experience to a level that virtual docking could be done with relative ease by a professional driver. In the current status, the driver will get feedback in different ways. The allows for testing different HMI options with professional drivers w.r.t. effectiveness as well as driver acceptance, with the aim to develop effective and intuitive HMI.
After two student thesis assignments including significant market research activities, a financial analysis tool has become available for internal use. The tool can calculate the business potential of the VISTA solution for specific logistics areas. This will support decisions of future end clients when considering VISTA to improve their logistics process.
Due to Covid-19 limitations, recent VISTA meetings have all been done online, using our already up-and-running Teams environment. Despite these limitations, many meetings took place, ranging from alignment on VR simulator sprint reviews and system architecture meetings up to work package leader meetings. This allowed the project to make the necessary progress.
Thanks to the good network of Bricklog, a cooperation with Visser Duiven allows the VISTA partnership to capture full size video material in real-life. This started using a simple webcam to quickly gather initial footage to train the camera-based localization algorithms. As these algorithms are now based on neural networks that need to be trained, real-life camera images are important in order to provide the type of training data that will result in robust RTLS (Real Time Localization System) performance. The image gives a hint of algorithm performance using a simple (mono)webcam, looking through badly reflecting windows. Look at the rectangles that show the inferred positions of truck and trailer.
At the IEDS event on 10 December 2019 an intermediate version of the VISTA VR simulator was successfully demonstrated. The realism in the simulator appeared good enough to let several persons dock a truck trailer combination backwards. Valuable feedback for testers was gathered to optimize the simulator in the coming months. The aim of the VISTA VR simulator is to be able to develop and test HMI variants for the VISTA truck docking support system. The simulator has great flexibility to present all kinds of HMI content to truck drivers in a variety of scenarios. Hence, HMI perception and resulting truck driver performance can be measured to optimize the VISTA HMI, ensuring market value of the resulting system. The VISTA VR simulator is special in the fact that the simulator uses co-simulation of the 3D engine together with accurate vehicle dynamics models, developed in MATLAB/Simulink®.
The leaflet of the IEDS event can be found here: Leaflet IEDS
At the 23rd of October 2019, VISTA partners visited the ROTRA distribution centre in Doesburg, NL to gain more insight in the behavior and needs of truck drivers. Several Truck drivers were interviewed and new eye-tracking tests were made to get better understanding of driver behavior and gaze patterns while docking the vehicle combination. This information will be used to better design the user interface of the future VISTA docking support system. In parallel, a first draft VR simulator setup was tested by the attendants as well as by a driver/instructor. The feedback will be used to upgrade the VR setup towards a better, more natural experience so it will become an effective tool for user interface development and testing.
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This meeting, hosted by Bricklog was intended to come to better interface definition between work packages 2, 3 and 4.
The alignment meeting served as meeting for all partners to align their input in the project (getting to know each other better, shared interest, project activities, planning, etc.)