This package provides a DVS simulation implemented as Gazebo plugin.

First, make sure the DVS datatypes are available in your installation. For this, clone the RPG DVS ROS package into your catkin workspace.

Then, clone this package into your workspace and rebuild.

This plugin can be used as a drop-in replacement for normal Gazebo camera plugins. Both, the DVS plugin and the CameraPlugin use the Gazebo CameraSensor internally.

The following SDF snippet shows an example usage:

<sensor name='camera' type='camera'>
    <camera name='__default__'>
        <horizontal_fov>1.8</horizontal_fov>
        <image>
            <width>128</width>
            <height>128</height>
        </image>
        <clip>
            <near>0.1</near>
            <far>100</far>
        </clip>
    </camera>
    <always_on>1</always_on>
    <update_rate>60</update_rate>
    <visualize>0</visualize>
    <plugin name='camera_controller' filename='libgazebo_dvs_plugin.so'>
        <cameraName>camera_front</cameraName>
        <robotNamespace>AADC_AudiTT</robotNamespace>
        <eventThreshold>10</eventThreshold>
        <cameraInfoTopicName>camera_info</cameraInfoTopicName>
        <!-- <eventsTopicName>events</eventsTopicName> -->
    </plugin>
</sensor>

The parameters robotNamespace, cameraName and eventsTopicName (default: "events") result in "$robotNamespace/$cameraName/$eventsTopicName" as the identifier of the provided events topic. In this case, events will be accessible from "/AADC_AudiTT/camera_front/events".

The parameter eventThreshold specifies the pixel-wise threshold which has to be exceeded for a event to be emitted for this pixel.

The sensor parameter update_rate has only limited effect in Gazebo. The real rate is determined by the rendering pipeline and can be way lower than the specified rate. Still, this implementation yields a higher event frequency than similar Python-based implementations as a standalone node.