Camera vs. Lidar • Hacker News Board

Re: Camera vs. Lidar

#91

Post by omilu » Fri, Aug 16, 2019, 1:18 PM UTC

KaiserPro wrote: post #84

cameldrv wrote: post #34

They are refuting a claim that wasn't made. If they need Lidar to do better annotations, fine. You'd only need the lidar on data collection/R&D cars though, and could just use cameras on production cars. The point Musk and others are making though is that the lidar on the market today has poor performance in weather. The cameras will struggle to a degree in weather as well, so not having good annotations when your de…

With respect, thats not what they are claiming They are saying that lidar enhances the perception system to get more accurate dimensions and rotations of objects to a greater distance. this means that you can predict far better, allowing you, for example, to drive at night full speed. Weather affects visual systems as well. The "ooo rain kills lidar" is noise at best. Visual cameras are crap at night. There is a reas…

>>Visual cameras are crap at night.

Mitigated somewhat with headlights

Re: Camera vs. Lidar

#92

Post by loourr » Fri, Aug 16, 2019, 1:22 PM UTC

This article is only considering static images. Lidar static "images" necessarily contain depth information so yeah obviously they'll have better depth estimates.

But that's really beside the point because the world is not static and any system attempting self-driving will need to take that into account.

Using parallax measurements which is what Tesla says they are doing, you can dramatically increase the estimates of depth measurements by comparing multiple frames of 2D images.

Also, just a reminder that Tesla is also using radar in conjunction with the cameras.

Re: Camera vs. Lidar

#93

Post by gambiting » Fri, Aug 16, 2019, 1:46 PM UTC

I think it's completely clear at this point that Tesla(or more specifically, Elon Musk) is just simply lying about what their cars will be able to do in the future with existing hardware. Don't get me wrong - the existing "autopilot" is fantastically good. But it's not going to jump from where it is now to full self driving, no matter how many years or millions are poured into it.

Re: Camera vs. Lidar

#94

Post by heyflyguy » Fri, Aug 16, 2019, 1:53 PM UTC

gambiting wrote: post #93

I think it's completely clear at this point that Tesla(or more specifically, Elon Musk) is just simply lying about what their cars will be able to do in the future with existing hardware. Don't get me wrong - the existing "autopilot" is fantastically good. But it's not going to jump from where it is now to full self driving, no matter how many years or millions are poured into it.

Elon is an eternal optimist that truly believes that the tech will catch up with his goals.

Re: Camera vs. Lidar

#95

Post by govg » Fri, Aug 16, 2019, 1:57 PM UTC

airnomad wrote: post #89

What if we have sensors/cameras/etc along the road and they feed data to whichever car is there? And if we also have cars share their sensor data? Would that speed things up in terms of achieving full autonomy?

Yes, drastically. But with it you bring new fears of how that data will be used by the government. You could also achieve something similar by forcing all vehicles to have embedded sensors that real time share data.

Re: Camera vs. Lidar

#96

Post by jgalt212 » Fri, Aug 16, 2019, 1:58 PM UTC

heyflyguy wrote: post #94

gambiting wrote: post #93

I think it's completely clear at this point that Tesla(or more specifically, Elon Musk) is just simply lying about what their cars will be able to do in the future with existing hardware. Don't get me wrong - the existing "autopilot" is fantastically good. But it's not going to jump from where it is now to full self driving, no matter how many years or millions are poured into it.

Elon is an eternal optimist that truly believes that the tech will catch up with his goals.

That's a truly optimistic view of Elon, the pessimistic view is that's he's PT Barnum.

Re: Camera vs. Lidar

#97

Post by WhompingWindows » Fri, Aug 16, 2019, 2:00 PM UTC

noneckbeard wrote: post #62

Some of this feels very cherry-picked. They’re comparing lidar vs camera on snapshots, when a model will always be continuously built as the scene changes. There’s also one instance where it gives lidar the advantage because it’s mounted on top of the car and can see over signs. What?!

Are they only utilizing one camera? Doesn't Tesla use multiple cameras and radar?

Re: Camera vs. Lidar

#98

Post by mark_l_watson » Fri, Aug 16, 2019, 2:01 PM UTC

I strongly recommend Lex Firdman’s recent interview with George Hotz where they covered this topic in some detail https://youtu.be/iwcYp-XT7UI

Re: Camera vs. Lidar

#99

Post by 693471 » Fri, Aug 16, 2019, 2:08 PM UTC

Animats wrote: post #72

Cruise Automation handling double-parked cars with LIDAR.[1] They show the scan lines and some of the path planning. Busy city streets, lots of obstacles. Waymo handling city traffic with LIDAR.[2] They show the scan lines and some of the path planning. Busy city streets, lots of obstacles. Tesla self-driving demo, April 2019.[3] They show their display which puts pictures of cars and trucks on screen. No difficult o…

> Look at the display. Where's the cross traffic info"

Tesla's display does not render all of the data that the computer knows about.

Additionally this article is assuming the camera based solution for Tesla will be single-camera. Last I checked the actual solution is going to be stereo vision of multiple cameras (think one on each side of windshield) and using ML to combine that data. The Model 3 does not have that capability though because its three cameras are center mounted.

Re: Camera vs. Lidar

#100

Post by ajross » Fri, Aug 16, 2019, 2:12 PM UTC

heyflyguy wrote: post #94

gambiting wrote: post #93

I think it's completely clear at this point that Tesla(or more specifically, Elon Musk) is just simply lying about what their cars will be able to do in the future with existing hardware. Don't get me wrong - the existing "autopilot" is fantastically good. But it's not going to jump from where it is now to full self driving, no matter how many years or millions are poured into it.

Elon is an eternal optimist that truly believes that the tech will catch up with his goals.

To be fair, though: Elon is shipping actual vehicles. I mean, I think the GM and Waymo offerings look great too, but I can't buy one. Even granting the premise that LiDAR is going to be a firm requirement, it's not clear to me that Tesla is actually behind the curve on real products. Adding a LiDAR system (or buying one from Waymo) to a Tesla seems naively simpler than finishing and shipping a whole new system from scratch.