Vision-based formation for UAVs

In this paper, we present a vision-based relative sensing system for UAVs to realize leader-follower formation flight without inter-vehicle communication. A monocular camera is mounted on the follower to detected the leader and measure the relative distance by using the geometry information of the leader without artificial markers. The measured relative distance is utilized to estimate the velocity and acceleration of the leader under the quasi-steady states assumption. Experimental results show that the proposed sensing system is capable of achieving the vision-based leader-follower formation flight.