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Alistair Foggin edited this page Aug 16, 2023 · 5 revisions

Setup the project

  • Set up SteamVR room scale (or standing but that is untested) It is a lot easier to set up in Windows.
  • Install Unity 2020.2 or higher (This project is 2022.2.3 but I would recommended latest LTS for your own projects.)
  • If in windows, set up Ubuntu Virtual Machine (VM). Alternatively you can run Ubuntu natively on another machine.
  • Follow this guide for installing Ubuntu 22.04 in VirtualBox: https://ubuntu.com/tutorials/how-to-run-ubuntu-desktop-on-a-virtual-machine-using-virtualbox

Once installed, you can optionally install virtualbox utils in Ubuntu to allow for shared folders:

sudo apt install virtualbox-guest-utils

Install ROS2 Humble: Ubuntu (Debian packages) — ROS 2 Documentation: Humble documentation

Network Settings

Power off the VM, and go to network settings. Change it to be attached to "Bridged Adapter", set Name to be the adapter connected to your network. Open up advanced, and set Promiscuous Mode to be "Allow All"

VM Bridged Adapter

ROS Packages and Setup

Start up the VM again, and create a new ROS 2 Workspace Creating a workspace — ROS 2 Documentation: Humble documentation

Install the Turtlebot3, Navigation2, SLAM_Toolbox, Compressed_Image_Transport packages

sudo apt update
sudo apt install ros-humble-turtlebot3 
sudo apt install ros-humble-turtlebot3-msgs
sudo apt install ros-humble-turtlebot3-gazebo

sudo apt install ros-humble-navigation2
sudo apt install ros-humble-nav2-bringup

sudo apt install ros-humble-slam-toolbox

sudo apt install ros-humble-compressed-image-transport

Also add the following to the ~/.bashrc file and restart the terminal

source /opt/ros/humble/setup.bash
export ROS_DOMAIN_ID=30 #TURTLEBOT3
export TURTLEBOT3_MODEL=burger

To install the ROS-TCP Endpoint

cd ~/ros2_ws/src
git clone -b main-ros2 https://github.com/Unity-Technologies/ROS-TCP-Endpoint.git
cd ..

Gazebo Classic Camera Simulation for Turtlebot3

Warning these files require root permissions to edit, and will be overwritten when updating certain packages

Open /opt/ros/humble/share/turtlebot3_gazebo/models/turtlebot3_burger/model.sdf And add this to the end before </model>

<joint name="camera_joint" type="fixed">
  <parent>base_link</parent>
  <child>camera_link</child>
  <pose>0 0 0.171 0 0 0</pose>
  <axis>
    <xyz>0 0 1</xyz>
  </axis>
</joint>


<link name="camera_link">
  <pose>0.05 0 0.17 0 0 0</pose>
  <collision name="camera_collision">
    <pose>0 0 0 0 0 0</pose>
    <geometry>
      <box>
        <size>0.05 0.05 0.05</size>
      </box>
    </geometry>
  </collision>

  <visual name="camera_visual">
    <pose>0 0 0 0 0 0</pose>
    <geometry>
      <box>
        <size>0.05 0.06 0.05</size>
      </box>
    </geometry>
  </visual>

  <inertial>
    <mass>1e-5</mass>
    <pose>0 0 0 0 0 0</pose>
    <inertia>
      <ixx>1e-6</ixx>
      <ixy>0</ixy>
      <ixz>0</ixz>
      <iyy>1e-6</iyy>
      <iyz>0</iyz>
      <izz>1e-6</izz>
    </inertia>
  </inertial>

  <sensor type="camera" name="camera">
    <update_rate>30.0</update_rate>
    <camera name="head">
      <horizontal_fov>1.3962634</horizontal_fov>
      <image>
        <width>800</width>
        <height>800</height>
        <format>R8G8B8</format>
      </image>
      <clip>
        <near>0.02</near>
        <far>300</far>
      </clip>
      <noise>
        <type>gaussian</type>
        <!-- Noise is sampled independently per pixel on each frame.
            That pixel's noise value is added to each of its color
            channels, which at that point lie in the range [0,1]. -->
        <mean>0.0</mean>
        <stddev>0.007</stddev>
      </noise>
    </camera>
    <plugin name="camera_controller" filename="libgazebo_ros_camera.so">
      <alwaysOn>true</alwaysOn>
      <updateRate>0.0</updateRate>
      <cameraName>turtlebot3_burger/camera</cameraName>
      <imageTopicName>image_raw</imageTopicName>
      <cameraInfoTopicName>camera_info</cameraInfoTopicName>
      <frameName>camera_link</frameName>
      <hackBaseline>0.07</hackBaseline>
      <distortionK1>0.0</distortionK1>
      <distortionK2>0.0</distortionK2>
      <distortionK3>0.0</distortionK3>
      <distortionT1>0.0</distortionT1>
      <distortionT2>0.0</distortionT2>
    </plugin>
  </sensor>
</link>

Open /opt/ros/humble/share/turtlebot3_gazebo/urdf/turtlebot3_burger.urdf and add the following before </robot>

<joint name="camera_joint" type="fixed">
  <axis xyz="0 1 0" />
  <origin xyz="0.05 0 0.165" rpy="0 0 0"/>
  <parent link="base_link"/>
  <child link="camera_link"/>
</joint>

<!-- Camera -->
<link name="camera_link">
  <collision>
    <origin xyz="0 0 0" rpy="0 0 0"/>
    <geometry>
        <box size="0.05 0.05 0.05"/>
    </geometry>
  </collision>

  <visual>
    <origin xyz="0 0 0" rpy="0 0 0"/>
    <geometry>
      <box size="0.05 0.05 0.05"/>
    </geometry>
    <material name="red"/>
  </visual>


  <inertial>
    <mass value="1e-5" />
    <origin xyz="0 0 0" rpy="0 0 0"/>
    <inertia ixx="1e-6" ixy="0" ixz="0" iyy="1e-6" iyz="0" izz="1e-6" />
  </inertial>
</link>

Setup on physical Turtlebot3

Do the initial setup of the Turtlebot3 following the official quick start guide

Make sure to select Humble at the top so that you are following the correct guide. It is also may be worth doing the PC setup on a native installation of Ubuntu during the initial setup of the Turtlebot3. For connecting to the Turtlebot3, the VM should be sufficient.

Install camera_ros on the Raspberry PI

sudo apt install ros-humble-camera-ros

Create a launch file picamera.launch.py on the Turtlebot3 and put the following code in it.

from launch import LaunchDescription
from launch.actions import DeclareLaunchArgument
from launch.substitutions import LaunchConfiguration, TextSubstitution

from launch_ros.actions import Node

def generate_launch_description():
	format_launch_arg = DeclareLaunchArgument(
    	'format', default_value=TextSubstitution(text='RGB888')
	)
	width_launch_arg = DeclareLaunchArgument(
    	'width', default_value=TextSubstitution(text='800')
	)
	height_launch_arg = DeclareLaunchArgument(
    	'height', default_value=TextSubstitution(text='800')
	)

	return LaunchDescription([
    	format_launch_arg,
    	width_launch_arg,
    	height_launch_arg,
    	Node(
        	package='camera_ros',
        	executable='camera_node',
        	name='camera',
        	parameters=[{
            	'format': LaunchConfiguration('format'),
            	'width': LaunchConfiguration('width'),
            	'height': LaunchConfiguration('height'),
        	}]
    	),
	])

Unity Setup

To run this project, clone the repository, and open the project in Unity. Open the scene Assets\_VR Robotics\Scenes\Base Scene.unity To connect it to the ROS VM, you have to tell the ROS TCP Connector the IP address which corresponds to the Ubuntu VM. To find that out run hostname -I in the VM. Then in Unity under Robotics->ROS Settings set the protocol to ROS2 and set the IP address. Within the Base Scene, open the ROS Tools gameobject and select the ROSConnectionPrefab. Then in the inspector set the ROS IP Address.

NOTE: To set up your own project that can connect to the VM, you need to install the ROS-TCP-Connector I would also recommend installing the Visualisations package in the same repository. Then you can follow similar steps as above to set the IP address. For setting up VR, you can follow the Unity Manual VR guide, and I would recommend installing the XR Interaction Toolkit too.

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