Developing Autonomous Drone Hardware and Software Using Python/Swift and RPi

Sahil KrishnaniFollow

Grade Level at Time of Presentation

Sophomore

Institution

Western Kentucky University

KY House District #

20

KY Senate District #

32

Department

WKU School of Engineering and Applied Sciences: WKU Center for Energy Systems

Abstract

Drone development has been on the rise since the turn of the century and has expanded to the consumer market. Nowadays anybody who wants to purchase a high-quality drone would have to spend upwards of $1000; however, lower price alternatives exist but they tend to leave out many key features. The purpose of this research is to develop a visually-appealing prototype with a rich feature set for a low cost and high-quality software such as autonomous flight software, facial recognition software, and user interfaces for both the iOS and the Android OS mobile environments. To construct the drone, a CAD was first developed along with an electrical diagram in order to make the construction process simple. Once the prototype was constructed, the Pixhawk 2.0 along with the Raspberry Pi(RPi) were configured to enable flight controls and running of the software, respectively. The software was then developed for autonomous flight and facial recognition using Python while the Chaquopy Python Plugin and Xcode were used for the user interfaces for Android OS and iOS, respectively. Once completed, the drone was able to fly autonomously and use the facial recognition software with a database and both mobile environments were working as well. An analysis on the completion of engineering goals was completed, and it was found that for the price of a low-quality drone, a high-quality drone could be developed. For these reasons, drone manufacturers should work on developing a low-cost, high-efficiency drone that performs similarly to expensive modern alternatives.

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Developing Autonomous Drone Hardware and Software Using Python/Swift and RPi

Drone development has been on the rise since the turn of the century and has expanded to the consumer market. Nowadays anybody who wants to purchase a high-quality drone would have to spend upwards of $1000; however, lower price alternatives exist but they tend to leave out many key features. The purpose of this research is to develop a visually-appealing prototype with a rich feature set for a low cost and high-quality software such as autonomous flight software, facial recognition software, and user interfaces for both the iOS and the Android OS mobile environments. To construct the drone, a CAD was first developed along with an electrical diagram in order to make the construction process simple. Once the prototype was constructed, the Pixhawk 2.0 along with the Raspberry Pi(RPi) were configured to enable flight controls and running of the software, respectively. The software was then developed for autonomous flight and facial recognition using Python while the Chaquopy Python Plugin and Xcode were used for the user interfaces for Android OS and iOS, respectively. Once completed, the drone was able to fly autonomously and use the facial recognition software with a database and both mobile environments were working as well. An analysis on the completion of engineering goals was completed, and it was found that for the price of a low-quality drone, a high-quality drone could be developed. For these reasons, drone manufacturers should work on developing a low-cost, high-efficiency drone that performs similarly to expensive modern alternatives.