Abstract
In this paper, we present a novel robotic system for heliography, which literally refers to painting with the sun. In the context of artistic creation, heliography requires delicately manipulating a magnifying glass to burn artwork on wooden panels, with solar energy. Since this painting procedure requires the human operator to be prolongedly exposed to intensive sunlight, it can cause potential sunburn on the skin or eyes. To avoid this issue, we consider performing heliography with a robotic manipulator in lieu of a human operator. By doing so, it is also believed that the capability of concentrating solar arrays by robot has deep implications for solar power generation technologies such as Concentrated Solar Power (CSP) and Concentrated Photovoltaics (CPV). To concentrate solar rays, our robot is equipped with a magnifying glass at the end-effector. Specifically, it is capable of 1) tracking in real-time the orientation of the sun, to collect a maximum amount of solar energy, 2) directing the solar rays's, to accurately heat the point of interest, and 3) controlling the heat power intensity at the target point, to achieve a desired steady state temperature or an appropriate heating process. The performance of the proposed method is verified by conducting heliography experiments with various patterns.