Drones as internet of video things front-end sensors: challenges and opportunities

Internet of Video Things (IoVT) has become an emerging class of IoT systems that are equipped with visual sensors at the front end. Most of such visual sensors are fixed one whereas the drones are considered flying IoT nodes capable of capturing visual data continuously while flying over the targets of interest. With such a dynamic operational mode, we can imagine significant technical challenges in sensor data acquisition, information transmission, and knowledge extraction. This paper will begin with an analysis on some unique characteristics of IoVT systems with drones as its front end sensors. We shall then discuss several inherent technical challenges for designing drone-based IoVT systems. Furthermore, we will present major opportunities to adopt drone-based IoVT in several contemporary applications. Finally, we conclude this paper with a summary and an outlook for future research directions.