PmWiki | Student / Ven's Braitenberg Vehicle

Strategy

My program will consist of two main stages:

Efficiently search the room for the bright light.
Make the Create slow down as it gets closer towards the light; upon reaching the light, the Create stops.

Searching for light

My plan is to have the Create begin searching by driving in a spiral formation. It will drive in circles that slowly increase in size until the photoresistor senses a light intensity greater than the ambient light (which will need to be measured on the day of the demonstration). If the Create hits a wall before it detects the light, it will then begin to hug and travel along the wall instead of spiraling.

Decelerating as approaching light

Once the presence of the light has been detected, the Create will rotate in place until it finds the position that results in the greatest photoresistor reading. Then the Create will decelerate driving forward by using a proportional (and maybe derivative and/or integral) control formula. The formula must be adjusted so that when the photoresistor sensor senses that the Create is at the light (which will also have to be measured on the day of the demonstration), the Create's velocity will be zero.

Minor additions

Of course, there are other minor stages that will need to be implemented, such as safe/unsafe conditions, adjustment to change the Create from photophilic to photophobic, the "wait for play" feature, and a 3 minute timer with the ability to add more time. Most of these, however, have already been coded for and can simply be copied into the Braitenberg code.