pyb_utils: utilities for PyBullet

This is a collection of utilities I've found useful for working with PyBullet, including:

• Collision detection: conveniently set up shortest distance computations and collision checking between arbitrary objects in arbitrary configurations with PyBullet. See the accompanying blog post.
• Ghost objects: add purely visual objects to the simulation, optionally attached to another body.
• Camera: virtual camera from which to get RGBA, depth, segmentation, and point cloud data. Also provides video recording using OpenCV.

Install and run

This package requires Python 3.7+. It has been tested on Ubuntu 16.04, 18.04, and 20.04.

From pip

pip install pyb_utils

From source

Clone the repo:

git clone https://github.com/adamheins/pyb_utils
cd pyb_utils

Install using poetry:

poetry install
poetry run python scripts/collision_detection_example.py  # for example

Or using pip:

python -m pip install .

Usage and examples

You can find example scripts demonstrating all of this package's utilities in the scripts/ directory:

• collision detection
• ghost objects
• camera
• video

Known issues

Feel free to open issues (or better yet, a pull request!) if you find a problem. Currently known issues:

• Video recording does not output MP4 videos correctly. The AVI format works, however.
• Ghost objects sometimes flicker (spooky, but undesirable).

License

MIT