Using hand-held game consoles for animal monitoring
W.F. Fledelius
Department of Computer Science, Aarhus, Denmark
Introduction
Experimental set-ups for monitoring and analysing animal movement and behavior typically require a personal computer equipped with frame grabber and video camera. Many experiments can, however, be performed using hand-held consoles, allowing for a much simpler and more portable set-up.
Method
A Nintendo GameboyTM, together with the Gameboy CameraTM, has been modified to capture and analyse video. The console has a working resolution of 128 x 123 pixels in 256 shades of grey and operates in the order of 1 frame per second, depending on the operation.
Operation
Five modes of operation are currently implemented: Distribution, Motion, Activity, Zones and Event Logger. 'Distribution' generates a two-dimensional map, indicating the amount of time spent in a given area. 'Motion' generates a similar map, indicating the amount of motion in a given area. 'Activity' logs the activity in the camera's field of view. 'Zones' generates an event record of activity in user-defined zones. Finally, 'Event Logger' generates an event record of up to eight different user-defined events, which are linked to keys on the console for manual monitoring without the camera.
Application
Suggested applications for the system included generating simple time budgets, analysing animals' use of space, and counting and registering diurnal activity. Besides the five modes of operation described here, others could also be implemented to increase the field of application.
Paper presented at Measuring Behavior 2002 , 4th International Conference on Methods and Techniques in Behavioral Research, 27-30 August 2002, Amsterdam, The Netherlands