A study on remote controlled systems real time 3-dimensional display on an IBM-PC host

In the control of a remote system, it is desirable if the operator can be provided with similar sensory inputs to that which he would experience in the remote task environment. Three dimensional colour display systems have been studied with the goal of providing the sensation of presence¹. These displays provide the operator with a view of the environment captured by the remote cameras. Although this information is important, an operator of a remotely controlled vehicle/station would still derive benefit from additional information especially if the data can be presented in a graphical form.

A teleoperator system has been established which adopts real time 3-dimensional wire-frame modelling of a robot manipulator on a microcomputer host system. The system incorporates the Matrox Space-Machine/640 to enable real time animation. This provides the operator with processed information relating to the robot orientation, and gripper position, orientation and state (open/close). This paper attempts to study the application of real time 3-D computer graphics to provide the operator with processed data to enable a more dextrous and responsive control of the remote station.