UAV simulator for grown-up people quality of life enhancement

Abstract

This paper presents the development of a virtual reality simulator for the management of a UAV (Unmanned Aerial Vehicle) focused on improving the quality of life of grown-up people. The present research has collected characteristics of gestures and physical movements from users made by other related research in order to study the same interaction within a virtual world. Through this research a smaller number of gestures were created improving the user learning curve without affecting the usability. The following implementation uses a client-server architecture composed of 2 Raspberry Pi devices and a Smartphone acting as a server the communication between them was achieved by employing Bluetooth Low Energy technology. The immersive virtual experience is accomplished by using Unity 3D and Google VR tools that allowed the design and display of a playful virtual environment as an approach to promote physical and cognitive skills such as spatial thinking and hand-eye coordination. By performing maneuvers through an aerial circuit filled with obstacles the proposed UAV simulator encourages motor and mental activity while the user is being entertained. The result is the improvement of the user quality of life by avoiding cognitive and physical sedentarism.