Two-Axis Camera Object Tracking Project In Action

This is a video of a project I undertook in action. The project goal was to implement two degree of freedom articulation of a camera to track an object in motion using computer vision techniques. This video shows the resultant mechanism in action. The camera is articulating to track a pink Post-It suspended and swinging freely behind the camera filming the mechanism.

The computer vision is accomplished via Python 3 and the OpenCV library running on a PC powered by XUbuntu 19.04 with a Logitech C920 HD webcam attached. When the desired object is detected and deviates past a certain buffer area beyond the center of the frame, instructions are sent to an Arduino microcontroller, via serial communication, which, in turn, controls two Nema 17 stepper motors via two L298N dual H-bridge motor controllers.

More technical details, a summation of the project, and the code making everything work can be found on GitHub: https://github.com/jtmorris/Two-Axis-Camera-Tracking