Drone teleoperation is usually accomplished using
remote radio controllers, devices that can be hard to master
for inexperienced users. Moreover, the limited amount of
information fed back to the user about the robot’s state, often
limited to vision, can represent a bottleneck for operation
in several conditions. In this work, we present a wearable
interface for drone teleoperation and its evaluation through a
user study. The two main features of the proposed system are
a data glove to allow the user to control the drone trajectory
by hand motion and a haptic system used to augment their
awareness of the environment surrounding the robot. This
interface can be employed for the operation of robotic systems
in line of sight (LoS) by inexperienced operators and allows
them to safely perform tasks common in inspection and search-and-
rescue missions such as approaching walls and crossing
narrow passages with limited visibility conditions. In addition
to the design and implementation of the wearable interface, we
performed a systematic study to assess the effectiveness of the
system through three user studies (n = 36) to evaluate the users’
learning path and their ability to perform tasks with limited
visibility. We validated our ideas in both a simulated and a real-world
environment. Our results demonstrate that the proposed
system can improve teleoperation performance in different cases
compared to standard remote controllers, making it a viable
alternative to standard Human-Robot Interfaces.
