At the HAN you can always choose from many interesting projects, but it may even be more fun to create your own! This is exactly what Sil Hettinga and Ralf Epping did!

They chose ‘air hockey’ as their project for the minor Embedded Vision Design and Machine Learning. “Sil had an air hockey table at his disposal,” says Ralf, “and we thought it would be fun to do a project with it for the minor Embedded Vision.

What did you learn from it?
“We’ve learned a lot about image processing and object detection. Recognising an object is not that difficult, but in our project it is important that we measure very quickly where on the table the hockey puck is. This brings challenges as the object recognition must happen very fast. The following factors are of great importance: keep it as simple as possible and choose the right hardware that is suitable for these type of measures. For our project we used a Jetson Nano which is basically a Raspberry Pi for image processing. The Jetson has special hardware that can make sure the hockey puck is detected very quickly.”

What new innovation have you discovered or what improvement(s) have you added?
“Our project is to test our skills and knowledge gained during the minor. Now we are curious about the practical implementation behind a self-learning system. During the minor, we were introduced to machine learning and deep learning. These are forms of self-learning systems. For our project, we made a hand gesture detector that can recognise whether you raise 1,2,3 or no fingers. This is used to activate features or to stop the programme.”

Are there any notable results to mention?
“Initially, our plan was to build a mechanical counterpart, but that turned out to be a bit complicated. We discovered that making a system that is able to follow the puck can become complex quite easily.”

The minor is part of your education. Why did you start studying ESE at the HAN?
“We decided to choose Embedded Systems Engineering because we were both interested in working with electronics and microcontrollers. You also see this, in combination with working with hardware, in Electrical and Electronic Engineering, but in ESE you get more involved in programming. That is what makes ESE so interesting for us!

Who can participate in this minor?
The minor is particularly suitable for Embedded Systems Engineering students and students Computer Technology and Information Technology. Students Electrical and Electronic Engineering or Mechatronics can also join, but then they must have sufficient programming experience.

Source and photography: HAN