Simulating a Kinect using Gazebo (without ROS)

asked 2015-11-15 22:37:58 -0600

Arun
21 ●3 ●4 ●6

updated 2015-11-17 17:51:51 -0600

I'm trying to simulate a Kinect sensor in Gazebo (6.1, standalone without ROS). I tried loading the Kinect model in ".gazebo/models/kinect" using the GUI: Insert->Kinect. I tried checking up the published topics using Ctrl+T, but could not see any image or point cloud topics pertaining to the Kinect.

I have a completely fresh install of Gazebo 6 on Ubuntu 14.04. Trying to load the PR2 model also results in no kinect related topics (other cameras seem to work - the stereo pair publishes ImageStamped messages).

Are there any extra libraries that need to be installed to get the kinect sensor to work? For example, do I need an openni driver (like in ros where you may have to run the openni launcher) for the kinect sensor to start publishing topics?

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answered 2015-11-18 12:55:27 -0600

Carlos Agüero
616 ●3 ●9

updated 2015-11-18 20:13:50 -0600

The Kinect model uses the DepthCamera sensor that I believe it's not finished. If you look at the source code in sensors/DepthCameraSensor.cc, you will see that there's no topic publication. I think these will be the set of steps to make it work:

Change the model.sdf to include a `depth_camera> section:

<sensor name="camera" type="depth">
  <update_rate>20</update_rate>
  <visualize>true</visualize>
  <always_on>1</always_on>
  <camera>
    <horizontal_fov>1.047198</horizontal_fov>
    <image>
      <width>640</width>
      <height>480</height>
      <format>R8G8B8</format>
    </image>
    <clip>
      <near>0.05</near>
      <far>3</far>
    </clip>
    <depth_camera>
      <output>points</output>
    </depth_camera>
  </camera>
</sensor>

Add to the DepthCameraSensor.cc the topic publication. You can use as a template the code in CameraSensor.cc. In the DepthCameraSensor case, the size of each pixel would be 4 bytes corresponding to a float. Also, we would access the depth information with this->camera->GetDepthData().

if (this->imagePub && this->imagePub->HasConnections())
{
  msgs::ImageStamped msg;
  msgs::Set(msg.mutable_time(), this->scene->GetSimTime());
  msg.mutable_image()->set_width(this->camera->GetImageWidth());
  msg.mutable_image()->set_height(this->camera->GetImageHeight());
  msg.mutable_image()->set_pixel_format(13);

 msg.mutable_image()->set_step(this->camera->GetImageWidth() * 4);
 msg.mutable_image()->set_data(this->camera->GetDepthData(),
 msg.image().width() * 4 * msg.image().height());

 this->imagePub->Publish(msg);
}

I'm assuming that the code in rendering:DepthCamera works and the depth image is properly rendered. If you don't want to use gazebo_ros_pkgs, you would have to modify the Gazebo source code, include those changes and probably debug it until it works. It will be fun and a nice contribution if you make it work.

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answered 2015-11-18 23:19:28 -0600

Arun
21 ●3 ●4 ●6

updated 2015-11-18 23:25:39 -0600

Thanks for the reply Carlos. I just updated the code in DepthCameraSensor.cc & .hh to add an image publisher & followed the steps you had pointed to above. When I load the kinect now, I am able to see an ImageStamped topic. When I click on that topic to display the image, gazebo crashes (the image is about half copied I think). With gdb, I got the following error:

Program received signal SIGSEGV, Segmentation fault. __memcpy_sse2_unaligned () at ../sysdeps/x86_64/multiarch/memcpy-sse2-unaligned.S:33 33 ../sysdeps/x86_64/multiarch/memcpy-sse2-unaligned.S: No such file or directory. (gdb) bt

%0  __memcpy_sse2_unaligned () at ../sysdeps/x86_64/multiarch/memcpy-sse2-unaligned.S:33
%1  0x00007ffff7b9095b in std::string::_M_replace_safe(unsigned long, unsigned long, char const*, unsigned long) () from /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libstdc++.so.6
%2  0x00007ffff5bde8a5 in gazebo::msgs::Image::set_data (this=0x393b380, value=0x0, size=1228800)
    at gazebo/msgs/image.pb.h:303
%3  0x00007ffff5bf0f2e in gazebo::sensors::DepthCameraSensor::UpdateImpl (this=0x7fff682bb050)
    at gazebo/sensors/DepthCameraSensor.cc:223
%4  0x00007ffff5c33837 in gazebo::sensors::Sensor::Update (this=0x7fff682bb050, _force=false) at gazebo/sensors/Sensor.cc:221
%5  0x00007ffff5c41f0d in gazebo::sensors::SensorManager::SensorContainer::Update (this=0xc0a730, _force=false)
    at gazebo/sensors/SensorManager.cc:541
%6  0x00007ffff5c426e6 in gazebo::sensors::SensorManager::ImageSensorContainer::Update (this=0xc0a730, _force=false)
    at gazebo/sensors/SensorManager.cc:658
%7  0x00007ffff5c40216 in gazebo::sensors::SensorManager::Update (this=0x7ffff63debc0 <SingletonT<gazebo::sensors::SensorManager>::GetInstance()::t>, _force=false)
    at gazebo/sensors/SensorManager.cc:159
%8  0x00007ffff5c3168c in gazebo::sensors::run_once (_force=false) at gazebo/sensors/SensorsIface.cc:118
%9  0x00007ffff786c9b0 in gazebo::Server::Run (this=0x6f2d50) at gazebo/Server.cc:516
%10 0x000000000402bd0 in main (argc=1, argv=0x7fffffffd478) at /home/barun/Projects/ExternalPackages/gazebo/gazebo/server_main.cc:40

which occurs when it tries to copy the data from the depth sensor (line 223 of DepthCameraSensor.cc):

msg.mutable_image()->set_data(this->camera->GetDepthData(),
        msg.image().width() * 4 *
        msg.image().height()); // NOTE: We need to get the depth data, not image data! ImageDepth = 4 bytes (float)

My ImageStamped msg format is

gazebo::common::Image::PixelFormat::R_FLOAT32

Any idea what's causing this issue? I've attached the source files.

DepthCameraSensor.cc DepthCameraSensor.hh

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Simulating a Kinect using Gazebo (without ROS)

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