Concealed Object Tracking for Conveyor Collision Prevention
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Solution Overview
Problem
Manufacturing environments with automated processes lack effective oversight to prevent collisions and damage between objects moving on conveyer belts or in unpredictable physical environments, leading to equipment damage and potential shutdowns.
Innovation Solution
A computer-program product that captures image data to detect and track objects, simulates their movement, and generates autonomous indications to augment the physical environment, preventing collisions by analyzing distance and trajectory between objects and predicting interactions to maintain safe distances.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Productivity
If automated processes are used without direct operator oversight, then productivity increases, but reliability decreases due to undetected collisions and equipment damage
Solution Approach 1:
A vision system acts as an intermediary between the automated conveyor belt system and the control system. The vision system captures images, detects objects and their trajectories, and provides data to the control system, enabling automated oversight without direct human intervention while maintaining equipment safety
Solution Approach 2:
The system implements continuous feedback by capturing images at multiple time points, tracking object movement and distance changes, and providing real-time information about potential collisions. This feedback loop enables the control system to detect and respond to unsafe conditions before they result in equipment damage
2Measurement precision
If physical environments with unpredictable object movement are monitored manually, then measurement precision may be maintained, but productivity decreases due to the difficulty and time required to track and control the environment
Solution Approach 1:
The patent replaces manual mechanical monitoring with an automated vision-based detection system. The system uses image capture and processing to automatically detect object positions, calculate trajectories, and determine distances, eliminating the need for manual observation while maintaining precise measurement capabilities
Solution Approach 2:
The vision system creates visual copies (images) of the physical environment at different time points. These image copies are then processed to extract object position, movement, and trajectory information, enabling accurate tracking of unpredictable object movement without direct human intervention
Data Source
AI summary
A computing system responsive to obtaining original image data, detects a set of data point(s), in the original image data, that indicates an object. The system determines, based on the set of data point(s), a set of pixels associated with the object in the original image data. The system generates an alternative visual identifier for the object that provides a unique identifier for the set of pixels absent in the original image data. The system generates, autonomously from intervention by any user of the computing system, pixel information to conceal feature(s) of the object. The system obtains modified image data comprising the alternative visual identifier. The modified image data further comprises the feature(s) of the object in the original image data visually concealed in the modified image data according to the pixel information. The system outputs an image representation of a trajectory of the object through the modified image data.