Shahram Ghandeharizadeh

Hamed Alimohammadzadeh, Shahram Ghandeharizadeh, Federico Cunico et al.

This companion paper provides artifacts and instructions on replicating the experiments in the ACM Multimedia 2024 paper entitled "Swarical: An Integrated Hierarchical Approach to Localizing Flying Light Specks." Swarm-based hierarchical, Swarical, is a localization technique that enables miniature drones, Flying Light Specks (FLSs), to accurately and efficiently localize and illuminate complex 2D and 3D shapes. It consists of two components, an offline planner and an online localization technique that executes on an FLS. The offline planner uses the FLS sensor specification for positioning to convert mesh files into swarms of FLSs. Some FLSs are dark and used only for localization. We reported the online localization technique to be fast and highly accurate. We describe how to reproduce this finding using our artifacts.

Hamed Alimohammadzadeh, Shahram Ghandeharizadeh

Swarical, a Swarm-based hierarchical localization technique, enables miniature drones, known as Flying Light Specks (FLSs), to accurately and efficiently localize and illuminate complex 2D and 3D shapes. Its accuracy depends on the physical hardware (sensors) of FLSs, which are used to track neighboring FLSs in order to localize themselves. It uses the hardware specification to convert mesh files into point clouds that enable a swarm of FLSs to localize at the highest accuracy afforded by their hardware. Swarical considers a heterogeneous mix of FLSs with different orientations for their tracking sensors, ensuring a line of sight between a localizing FLS and its anchor FLS. We present an implementation using Raspberry cameras and ArUco markers. A comparison of Swarical with a state of the art decentralized localization technique shows that it is as accurate and more than 2x faster.

Shahram Ghandeharizadeh

Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) have moved beyond a platform for hobbyists to enable environmental monitoring, journalism, film industry, search and rescue, package delivery, and entertainment. This paper describes 3D displays using swarms of flying light specks, FLSs. An FLS is a small (hundreds of micrometers in size) UAV with one or more light sources to generate different colors and textures with adjustable brightness. A synchronized swarm of FLSs renders an illumination in a pre-specified 3D volume, an FLS display. An FLS display provides true depth, enabling a user to perceive a scene more completely by analyzing its illumination from different angles. An FLS display may either be non-immersive or immersive. Both will support 3D acoustics. Non-immersive FLS displays may be the size of a 1980's computer monitor, enabling a surgical team to observe and control micro robots performing heart surgery inside a patient's body. Immersive FLS displays may be the size of a room, enabling users to interact with objects, e.g., a rock, a teapot. An object with behavior will be constructed using FLS-matters. FLS-matter will enable a user to touch and manipulate an object, e.g., a user may pick up a teapot or throw a rock. An immersive and interactive FLS display will approximate Star Trek's Holodeck. A successful realization of the research ideas presented in this paper will provide fundamental insights into implementing a Holodeck using swarms of FLSs. A Holodeck will transform the future of human communication and perception, and how we interact with information and data. It will revolutionize the future of how we work, learn, play and entertain, receive medical care, and socialize.