Legacy

When the Centre was funded back in 2014 by the Australian Research Council it was recognition of the importance of our mission to establish this new field of Robotic Vision, a combination of robotics, computer vision and AI, in order to create robots that see.  It was also validation that our vision could only be achieved through a concerted, large-scale and collaborative effort between some of the most qualified and talented researchers in our field.

Seven years on, not only have we successfully created this new field of robotic vision, we have established Australia as world leaders in the field.  We have also proven the importance of robotic vision to the global agenda and the role it can play in solving many of the world’s grand challenges.

This reality has been achieved through the high-quality work of our people across many domains; scientific and applied research, training and education, promotion and dissemination of our work. A comprehensive list of our achievements can be found within the Centre Director’s report found here.

The Centre’s Executive also thought it was important for our Centre members to have a say in what they thought our Top 10 legacy activities were.  In 2020, our full final year of operation, the Centre held a ‘Legacy Jam’.  A two-week interactive online event that provided an opportunity for all Centre members, past and present, to collaborate simultaneously and irrespective of geographical distance, role or level.  After an impressive two weeks of engagement in this activity the result was an outstanding top ten list that we have now celebrated through videos and stories on our Centre’s legacy website, which you can find here.

Finally, we wanted to ensure that two important activities, established by the Centre, continued beyond the Centre’s life.  The first is our Robotic Vision Summer School. The summer school is a week-long intensive course designed to cultivate and inspire the next generation of vision-based roboticists.  The only annual course of its kind, the summer school attracts interest from all over the world, providing attendees a chance to learn about both foundational and advanced topics in computer vision and robotics from world-leaders in the field.

The second was to facilitate the continued connection and collaboration between a critical mass of global experts in the areas of robotics, computer vision and AI.  Experts that will not only continue to work and collaborate together, but can be called upon by government, policy makers and media for expert opinion; and to provide information and advocacy to government, industry and the general population.

It was from the Centre’s desire to continue these activities, and in doing so assure continued growth in the field of Robotic Vision, that the idea for Robotic Vision Australia was born.

Robotic Vision Australia has now been established as not-for-profit entity and you can read more about it and its ongoing development here.

As impressive as all of these achievements are, there can be no doubt that the Centre’s greatest legacy is its people.  We succeeded in attracting the best and the brightest in our field and the successes we have had, and the things we have achieved, are only because of these individuals working together.