Development of Small-Size Multi Camera System for Snake-like Robot, and Display of Wide View-Angle Image

"IRS Souryu" is snake-like robot that is used for victim search in narrow space. We aim at development of multi camera system for "IRS Souryu" and display of wide view angle image for controlling it and searching for victims by using the multi camera system. Advantages of our developed multi camera system are that 1. The number of cameras can be increased by adding multi camera module, 2. Multi camera module is small and has 4 small-size CMOS cameras, and 3. Length of cable can be extended easily because of use of Ethernet. In this paper, we describe concept of acquisition and display of wide view-angle visual information using the multi camera system. We explain composition of multi camera system and its installation on IRS Souryu. We performed an experiment of victim searching by IRS Souryu equipped with 32 cameras. An operator was able to find a victim without extra movement of the robot. Then, the operator was also able to find the next open space to move. We explain the details of the experiment.