Vision-Based Indoor Localization of Nano Drones in Controlled Environment with its Applications
 
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1
Electrical Engineering Department, Indian Institute of Technology Bombay, Mumbai, India
 
2
Centre for Systems and Control, Indian Institute of Technology Bombay, Mumbai, India
 
3
Embedded Real-Time Systems/e-Yantra Lab, Indian Institute of Technology Bombay, Mumbai, India
 
4
Computer Science and Engineering Department, Indian Institute of Technology Bombay, Mumbai, India
 
 
Publication date: 2026-03-11
 
 
Acta Mechanica et Automatica 2026;20(1)
 
KEYWORDS
ABSTRACT
Navigating unmanned aerial vehicles in environments where GPS signals are unavailable poses a compelling and intricate challenge. This challenge is further heightened when dealing with Nano Aerial Vehicles (NAVs) due to their compact size, payload restrictions, and computational capabilities. This paper proposes an approach for localization using off-board computing, an off-board monocular camera, and modified open-source algorithms. The proposed method uses three parallel proportional-integral-derivative controllers on the off-board computer to provide velocity corrections via wireless communication, stabilizing the NAV in a custom-controlled environment. Featuring a 3.1cm localization error and a modest setup cost of 50 USD, this approach proves optimal for environments where cost considerations are paramount. It is especially well-suited for applications like teaching drone control in academic institutions, where the specified error margin is deemed acceptable. Various applications are designed to validate the proposed technique, such as landing the NAV on a moving ground vehicle, path planning in a 3D space, and localizing multi-NAVs. The created package is openly available at https://github.com/simmubhangu/eyantra_drone to foster research in this field.
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