Look where i'm going and go where i'm looking: Camera-up map for unmanned aerial vehicles

To optimize UAV reconnaissance operations, direction of viewing and direction of travel must be allowed to diverge. Our challenge was to design a control and display strategy to allow the operator to easily look where they're going, go where they're looking, and look and go in different directions. Two methods of control were devised to align traveling forward, viewing forward and commanding forward. The operator can command the unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) to turn to the camera direction or command the camera to point in line with the direction of travel (eyes forward). We have also introduced a new camera-up map orientation. The operator can easily cycle through North-up, track-up, and camera-up to provide the best link between the exocentric and ego-centric frames of reference. Ego-centric and exocentric perspectives allow the operator to combine or separate the vehicle's movement and the camera's view to optimize the search task while maintaining situation awareness of flight hazards.