Foosball Tracking

For too long, humanity has lived in a world devoid of a system that can automatically track a foosball as it traverses the table. Recording at 30 frames per second, our MakoU-130b greyscale camera is able to detect, and assign a region of interest to a ball as it is hit around the table. As the ball changes position across the frames, the pixel values change to white. If an area of white pixels appear in a frame that is about the size of a foosball, our code exports the (X,Y) coordinates of that area. To visualize the motion of the ball, the program Microsoft ScenePic takes those coordinates and draws the motion of the ball. This type of program can also easily be applied to other tabletop sports such as Air Hockey. A major issue with our code was making sure the code could still find the ball when obstructed by the rods. Using motion sensors strategically placed around the table, the ball can be detected even when the camera cannot see it. We found that 30 frames per second provides enough information to track the motion of the ball over time, and also does not bombard the program with too much information. Using a camera that records in greyscale also cuts down on the processing time. Visitors will be able to play a round of foosball and view the data from their game in real time.