An electronic marker tag detection smart camera for object localization

Abstract

In this paper a modulated light detection smart CMOS image sensor is presented. The design has the ability to sense asynchronous signals transmitted from electronic markers such as flashing light emitting diodes (LEDs) tagged on moving robots. With the presented sensor, object localization and position detection functions are simplified, performed at higher speeds in real time, and power requirement is reduced. The sensor in-pixel processing, filters out the background image data and detects the modulated marker regions. Object localization is facilitated by the use of distributed sensors to cover a more extended space. Since marker locations are extracted locally at each sensor, data transmission rate at each node and power demand is reduced; thus the sensor nodes can be designed as wireless and self powered units. The functionality and power consumption of the proposed design are presented in the 0.35µm standard CMOS technology.