Transparent Robot Behavior Using Augmented Reality in Close Human-Robot Interaction

Most robots consistently repeat their motion without changes in a precise and consistent manner. But nowadays there are also robots able to dynamically change their motion and plan according to the people and environment that surround them. Furthermore, they are able to interact with humans and cooperate with them. With no information about the robot targets and intentions, the user feels uncomfortable even with a safe robot. In close human-robot collaboration, it is very important to make the user able to understand the robot intentions in a quick and intuitive way. In this work we have developed a system to use augmented reality to project directly into the workspace useful information. The robot intuitively shows its planned motion and task state. The AR module interacts with a vision system in order to display the changes in the workspace in a dynamic way. The representation of information about possible collisions and changes of plan allows the human to have a more comfortable and efficient interaction with the robot. The system is evaluated in different setups.