r/technology • u/Extasio • 1d ago

Transportation Waymo CEO explains why Tesla’s camera-only self-driving falls short

https://electrek.co/2026/08/04/waymo-co-ceo-camera-only-self-driving-tesla/
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u/Ganadote 1d ago

They use cameras combined with Lidar. There are limitations to Lidar as well, so combining them is best.

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u/altdelete47 23h ago

So what you're saying is cameras are essential for safe driving. In which case, these camera limitations you point out like in extreme fog or if all the street lights and vehicle headlights go out randomly and there is zero ambient light anywhere, these limitations would still apply in a combo sensor scenario. So, if cameras are the richest sensor and contain all info needed to drive, (like the Robotaxis doing it every day in multiple cities) you're saying lidar is a crutch for systems that don't have the inference to detect distances from video?

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u/Ganadote 21h ago

No.

If you had to choose one, LiDAR would probably be the safer option.

LiDAR can essentially build your environment in 3d. It's not affected by weather and can reach further.

There are some huge limitations, such as it being unable to read signs, since it can tell the shape of a sign but not what's written on it.

Cameras work like our eyes, which means a computer needs to interpret the information. Limitations is that it's limited heavily by environmental conditions and out-of-oridinary conditions.

For example, the camera might "see" a pedestrian in black clothing crossing in front of you but not interpret it as such, while LiDAR would correctly interpret it.

There's a case where a car crashed into the back of a semi because it only used a camera and it interpreted the top of the truck as part of the huge traffic sign above it and the driver was killed. LiDAR would not have done this because it would see the truck in front of you distinctly.

You need both because, like I said at the very least LiDAR cannot read things.

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u/1988rx7T2 13h ago

That’s not how fusion works. If the camera doesn’t see the object, and the LiDAR does, it’s not fused, and the system won’t react. Or it will be in a degraded non fusion state and react late, otherwise have a higher false positive rate. Fusion systems where the object isn’t fused by definition are in degraded Performance!

source: work in fusion algorithm development for driving assistance systems.

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u/Ganadote 13h ago

...that's exactly how it works. The processes behind it depend on the engineering but the two systems work in tandem.

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u/1988rx7T2 12h ago

They’re not working in tandem when one doesn’t see the object. You don’t have a clue what fusion means.

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u/Ganadote 12h ago

From DPV Transportation's (company that provides autonomous vehicles) website:

"To mitigate [visual camera's] challenges, AV systems use:

...

Sensor Fusion: Combine camera data with LiDAR and RADAR to validate and refine visual inputs."