#SelfDriving Defined: What is vehicle perception and why does it matter?
Rachel Fukaya, Director of Brand
Self-driving cars, autonomous vehicles, whatever you call them; they’re cute, they drive better than you do, and they’re coming. The future of transportation may still include traffic but we’ll also get 100% more googley-eyes in our commutes, so everyone wins.
While it’s easy to understand what self-driving cars do (hint: they drive themselves), it’s not so easy to understand how they do it. Some of us don’t care how the sausage gets made, just that it tastes good, but autonomous vehicles could kill us if they aren’t safe — so let’s dig in.
Vehicle Perception = Your Car’s Eyes
Long before self-driving cars were possible, on of the first vehicle perception surfaces — the windshield — helped us, as the drivers, see the road ahead while keeping bugs and dirt out of our eyes. When it was just a human and her car driving on the open road, there were few perception surfaces to manage. My eyes, the windshield, and headlamps were all I needed to mind in order to stay safe.
Today, humans aren’t the only drivers on our roads and vehicle perception has changed too.
How vehicle perception has evolved and multiplied
In the age of self-driving and driver assisted cars, vehicle perception now encompasses any hardware surface (windshield, camera, sensor, etc.) or software program that enables a driver or vehicle to perceive its environment.
These perception surfaces all work together to ensure passengers and goods travel safely to their destinations. And just as our eyes can’t see when we get dirt in them, these vehicle perception surfaces can’t see or operate safely when bugs, mud, dirt and freezing rain coat their surfaces.
Keeping vehicle perception surfaces clear will save lives (that’s why it matters)
The way I see it, vehicle perception might just be the most important safety issue for self-driving and driver assisted cars. Enabling these surfaces to perceive their environments at all times will directly translate to safer riding for passengers and safer roads for cyclists, pedestrians and pets.
This is what drives us at SEEVA. We’re on a mission to design and deploy perception enablement systems that intuitively communicate with and clean vehicle perception surfaces when they encounter real-world climate and road conditions. This is how engineering teams will ensure the safety of passengers and goods while increasing vehicle uptime and consumer trust in mobility.
Only together will we realize our autonomous, googley-eyed future. Learn more about SEEVA and what we do all day in our video.
