The Aircraft Imaging Platform system is a part of the ongoing Space Systems and Operational Laboratory (SSOL) project. The current project of SSOL is to take aerial photos of Ames so that the images can help to determine the amount of light pollution in Ames. And the mission of AIP is to continue design of the navigation software in Visual C++ for use in a small private plane with the help of GPS technology. The software assists the pilot to fly in a desired path and control the settings of the camera, for instance the interval between each photo. AIP will integrate GPS data to overlay on video input from a video camera.

AIP has designed a navigational program that shows the pilot the specific checkpoints and the flight path on a laptop computer. The program informs the pilot how far the plane is from the checkpoint. The checkpoint is a three dimensional point in space that marks where a picture is to be taken. If the pilot misses a checkpoint, the program recalculates a flight path that will lead the pilot back to the missed checkpoint. The program is designed to insure that the pilot covers all the checkpoints and no checkpoint is repeated. It also informs the pilot when a particular checkpoint has been reached. In addition, the program controls the camera shutter release timing. When the plane reaches a checkpoint, the program activates the protocol for automated shutter release. A user interface was design to facilitate the pilot's operation of the navigational and photography control.

With the current system it is difficult to determine where a specific photo was taken due to the fact that we do not have the GPS coordinates on the photograph. Therefore, we will be designing a system for integrating GPS data and live video recording. This recording can be cross-referenced with the still photographs to help determine the location of the photograph and other environmental variables that were present during the flight. There is no documentation of this system. This presents problems when new members are added to the design team and need to become familiar with the how the system works. It also means any users of the system will have to be trained by someone who knows who to operate the system. We will be working on getting documentation written for the AIP system.

Functional

The main functional objective of AIP is as follow:

1. Designing the VDO so that GPS data is added to aerial video for recording
2. Finish parallel port activation system

1. Replace experimental circuit board in the control box with a fully functional integrated circuit board
2. Creating full documentation of the AIP system
3. Verify that the current code is operating with the correct spatial and temporal dimensions

The additional objectives include replacing the present experimental board with an integrated circuit board, creating documentation of the AIP system, and verifying that the AIP system code is operating with the correct spatial and temporal dimensions.

This software will be written in Visual C++ because it is the most commonly used programming language. Since all the equipment will be mounted inside the aircraft, temperature will not be a factor that will affect the performance of the equipment such as the laptop, camera, and GPS receiver. The laptop will be mounted on the cockpit and will have a weight of less than 3 kg. Due to defense reasons, GPS receivers available in the market can only be used at a maximum altitude of 10000 ft above the sea level. The VCR being used for the recording of VDO data requires a 110-volt power supply that won't be available in flight. A solution for supplying power to the VCR will have to be engineered.

The laptop will collect the data from the GPS receiver and send the information to the VDO through a serial port connection. The VDO will take the video feed from a camcorder and overlay the image with the GPS data. The VDO image will be sent to a VCR for recording. We will be researching a solution for the VCR power supply problem. A battery supply with a voltage converter device seems to be the most logical solution at this time.