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Attach the camera and lens if separated.
Replace the battery in the camera if low. I have found that
Attach camera to the flash bracket. It is held in place by a screw and two washers. Try to align camera lens to parallel with the ground as best you can, and tighten as much as is reasonable. If the camera is too loose, it does not have a risk of falling but the BBot’s movement can jostle it and cause it to be pointed at an angle, which can lead to the amiga being in frame, pot edges being cut-off, etc. if this was not anticipated.
Attach the camera to the BBot bracket. The black triangle piece on the back of the flash bracket will slide into the piece toward the bottom of the BBot z-axis. Make sure to have a strong grip on the flash/camera and always have a hand below the camera. It can take a couple tries to properly hook it on (sometimes only one side will slide in), so you want to ensure you do not drop it.
Unscrew the cap on the BBot box USB port. At this point, you may attach the camera to the box via the USB-C to USB-A cable. If using a long cable, make sure it does not hang below the camera so that it does not get in any of the photos.
If there is a risk of rain or if it is a hot, sunny day, it is advisable to put a cover over the camera.
Place the four amiga batteries into the BBot. There is a battery slot above each wheel that they will slide into. Make sure it slides into the bench bot’s internal track, it can be easy to slide one of the sides on top the track instead of in it.
Once all batteries are inserted, you may put the keys into the battery. When turning from “Unlocked” to “Off”, a little peg will push out of the battery (on it’s bottom side) to enter a hole in the frame of the Amiga. If you cannot change the battery from “Unlocked,” then it is likely the peg cannot extend down into the hole due to a misalignment. You may just have to wiggle the battery around a little bit, or the battery may not be in the tracks and you may have to slide it out and slide it back in properly.
Plug the dangling power cables into their batteries. Each battery has its own power cable.
Turn on the batteries with the key.
At this point BBot will begin booting up. The Amiga interface will be immediately available to use, while the BBot app interface will take a minute or two to boot. Remove the cover from the amiga interface, and press start. Reduce the motor speed to 4 bars (a value of 80). We do not want to BBot moving too fast.
Adjust the BBot alignment if needed using the joystick. At MD, the bench itself is a little curved so it can be difficult to get a straight alignment. Try your best to get the BBot wheels to be as parallel as you can with the left and right edges of the pots. It is okay to pause the BBot when it is running to make quick alignment adjustments later when you are conducting the batch collection. When choosing a starting place, make sure the camera is above the first row.
On the Amiga interface, click the “Auto” tab on the left (it is an A surrounded by a circle). On this page, turn auto-control on. The light on the joystick should be orange or blue. When this is on, the BBot will be able to control itself (so the Y-axis is now controlled), but the joystick will be unresponsive. To make further BBot adjustments with the joystick, you may turn this off when needed. Make sure to turn back on after making your adjustments, however, because if BBot is started with this “off,” then it will be unable to move forward and will continuously take images of the same row.
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Discard non-target weeds or overlapping plants by pulling them, shaking off their soil, and placing them in into a bucket or bag. Do not leave removed weeds or plants on pots or on the landscape fabric. This is to avoid detecting them in the images that we collect.
remove Remove overlapping target weeds in all pots
remove Remove non-target weeds from pots and from the background area
check Check inside the pots for non-target weeds
check Check and remove weeds growing from underneath the pots
check Check for and remove weeds growing on the landscape fabric
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Check aperture is correct
check Check that the focus is correct
Check the flash power
Check height of the lens from the potting soil surface using a measuring tape
Place the colorchecker next to the potTake a test imagescolor checker in frame of the starting position
Open the BBot app on the BBot interface and press the “take image” button to take a test image.
Camera and Flash Settings Table
Lens height above potting soil surface | Aperture | Focus | Flash Power |
---|---|---|---|
1.66 m |
4. Check
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and Adjust BBot App Settings
To avoid the Amiga/BBot frame being in the images, we start the camera at a position further in the X-axis, away from its right/leftmost position, which I am referring to as “0”. To get the camera into proper position, move the camera to the “0” position so that it is at its standard starting place, and then move it whatever distance your site species in the table below (the “x-axis starting” column).
If you are changing your species map (or need to replace it, as sometimes it will clear itself when restarting the app or BBot), use the “Species Map” tab to build it. Use the information in the table corresponding to your site to build the species map. At the moment, what you select for the “species” itself does not matter (we do not use that metadata and there are limited options). Just make sure to select a species from the list. If you leave it as “none”, BBot will not take images there. After making your settings, click add rows and your map will appear on the right side of the screen. If it looks good to you, then press “Save.” If you do not press save, then the map will not appear in the “Traversal” tab and you will have to rebuild it.
BenchBot App Programmed settings table
Semi-Field Potting Area Dimensions | Semi-Field Physical Pot Layout | BB App Programmed Settings | Notes | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Site | Width | length | Num Pots Per Row | Number of Rows | On Center pot spacing | Programmed Number of Rows | Pots Per Row | Pot Spacing | Row spacing | X-axis starting | Z-axis height | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
NC | 7.0m | 33.5m | 15 | 1.5 ft | 15 | 15 | 43 cm | 43 cm | 58 cm | 1.7 m | updated 11/12/2024 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
MD (BARC) | 6.1m | 39.0m | 80 | 11 | 45cm | 30cm | 40 cm | Updated 10/19/2024 MD (BARC) | 6.1m | 39.0m | 77 | 12 | 50 cm | 43 cm | BARC Test 1 7/8/24 | 6.1m | 39.0m | 40 cm | 25 cm | Amiga not removed from FOV. Successful reconstruction (MD_2024-07-08) | BARC Test 2 7/9/24 | 6.1m | 39m | 102 | 11 | 50 | 38 | Amiga removed from FOV. Failed reconstruction (only 40 unaligned images) | BARC Test 3 7/11/24 | 6.1m | 39m | 12 | 45 | 30 | ||||
Amiga removed from FOV. | NCSU | 7.0m | 33.5m | 79 | 8 | 53 cm | 38 cm | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
NCSU Test 1 7/9/24 | 7.0m | 33.5m | 40 | 19 | 39 | 25 | Start with 3cm offset from home on X axis. Failed reconstruction, however significant improvement. Amiga not removed from FOV | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
NCSU Test 2 7/11/24 | 40 | 17 | 39 | 25 | Start with 54cm offset Amiga should not appear in pics | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
NCSU 7/15/24 to Present | Variable | 15 | 45 cm | 30 cm | Start with 73cm offset Amiga should not appear in pics (but will if the camera is tilted). | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
NCSU 10/30/24 | 15 | 21 | 46cm | 25 | 15 | 46 cm | 46 cm | this is the start of the collection season. this is the first setting to try | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
TX |
5.
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Begin the Batch
Start BBot collection via the “run” button on the “Traversal” tab
Stick around for at least the first two rows to ensure everything is working properly. If the BBot is not rolling forward after a row, then the auto button on the Amiga interface is likely in the wrong state (the joystick light should be blue or orange, not white).
Every non and then, when BBot reaches the ends of a row, check these outermost photos to make sure the pot is fully in the frame and no Amiga is in frame. If either of these happened, then your camera may not be parallel to the ground, or you may need to adjust BBot’s position with the joystick.
Depending on site, you may have to replace the flash battery every once and a while.
At MD, our BBot does not charge the flash as it goes along, so the battery is not gaining any charge. I find that the Battery lasts about 2.5 species normally, so I like to change it out at the end of the second species and the end of the fourth species. Make sure to pause the BBot traversal before doing so, and also when you slip the new battery in, turn the flash on. The flash does not automatically turn on (even if it was still on when your removed the old battery), so you will have to manually turn it on again.
6. Break Down Collection Equipment
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