Watch this incredible video. It has Shelley, the autonomous vehicle from the Stanford program (not to be confused with the Stanford car that ended up at Google), tearing up a race track. In collaboration with VW, they have been working on an Audi TT which seems a lot lighter on equipment – it doesn’t even have a LIDAR.

It’s quite incredible to watch. Currently it’s still a few seconds off the track record but there is no mention of whether the record is held by a superior car, as opposed to a superior driver.

Stanford’s article takes it away:

Other than some decals and a few extra antennas, there’s nothing outwardly remarkable about the white Audi TTS zipping around the track at Thunderhill Raceway, north of Sacramento, Calif. Its tires squeal as it zigs through chicanes. Its engine growls as it tops 120 mph on the straights. The car gets around the 3-mile course in less than 2-1/2 minutes, a time that rivals those posted by professional drivers.

HT Paul Godsmark and Gabriel S

The title says it all. This is hilarious.

We’ve talked before about this project but this is the first time (as far as I’m aware) that the US media has actually talked about it.

The video is from the Autonomos project in Germany, a team from Free University Berlin looking at autonomous vehicles.

A not sure how to embed this one so : Click here to see it.

Thanks Gabriel S for sending this in.

Great new TED talk just uploaded to Youtubes.

Chris Gerdes of Stanford talking about his teams efforts to create a car that can test the limits – without a driver.

HT: Ben R and Gabriel S

Courtesy Mohammad P, this video by Apparatus Inc:

Interesting points:

- The video features localised interruption marketing. It could be the case that the occupant has specifically asked the vehicle to notify him when passing the chain of coffee shops, however.

- The car occupant switches between sport on a remarkably small screen..

- The concept largely ignores the prevalence of smartphones. Weather updates are not a realistic feature in a driverless car. Smartphones take care of this.

- Looking sideways would almost definitely give me car sickness.  Not sure about the readers.

My overall impression is that while the video is cool  it overestimates the amount of interaction that people will desire to have with their transportation.

We have long stated that the development of driverless cars will be greatly advanced by commercial applications which are more viable at higher price points. Logistics is the field we have consistently had at the front of mind but it’s heartening to see these videos from CASCrop, which is a grant program designed to incentivize automation strategies for sectors of the farming industry.

It’s all part of their Autonomous Prime Mover program:

Just as tractors can be fitted with larger and smaller hydraulic systems with different implements for multiple operations, we’re developing technology so one vehicle can perform a variety of automated functions, saving cost on ownership. We call it Autonomous Prime Mover—APM for short. “Autonomous” means it drives and steers by itself, “prime” because it is the fundamental component and “mover” because it will transport other devices. Our vision for APM is commercial-grade affordable weed spraying, mechanical string thinning, and hitching other crop intelligence systems.

Hat Tip – Mohammad Poorsatep.

Researchers from Standford University test their driverless Audi at the Thunderhill Park Racing Track in Willows, California.

A series of videos have been uploaded to Youtube in the last month by representatives of Chumdancha, a Korean company dedicated to developing safety technologies such as lane departure technology.

This most recent video is typical of the series, with the driver sitting back and the car clearly driving itself down a busy freeway. The car is driving at slower speeds than the rest of the traffic which means we don’t see any attempts to brake or overtake.

The technology and accompanying videos don’t seem to represent a serious autonomous attempt at autonomous driving, appearing to be more like an adaptive cruise control system.

This video from 2012, uploaded by the same company, has the driver sitting in the back seat of the vehicle:

The widespread, organic development of autonomous vehicle technology just shows how close we are to seeing marketability of these kinds of products.

Thanks to Gabriel S for the inspiration for this post.

The Driverless Car Summit is coming in a few days. Part of the summit is a mini film festival.

Here’s the original page with the finalists.

The videos are below! What’s your favorite? To watch all four will take less than 10 minutes. I think all are great.

All the videos below are worth watching in my opinion.

Chris Urmson talking about the Google Driverless car program (HT Paul Godsmark):

Autonomous Car Powerslides Into Parking Spot:

Sebastian Thrun – detailed talk on the evolution of driverless vehicles. (3 parts):

The single wheel motorcycle – the future of DCs?

Both the next videos come courtesy Gabriel Sniman: