Development of a guide robot interacting with the user using information projection — Basic system

This paper presents a guide robot with an information projection interface. The robot can detect multiple persons around it and choose the closest one as a user. This is realized using an omnidirectional camera and a laser range finder. The robot also has a projector with a pan-tile mechanism. It can project information anywhere in the environment and guide a person. The user can input commands by simple gestures using the foot on the dialog box projected onto the floor. After destination decision, the robot guides him/her by its motion and information projected onto the floor/wall/ceiling. The displayed information is changed corresponding to his/her position. Through experiments, we verified that the robot could detect a user and guide him/her.