ROBOTS DREAMS

Will Work For Robots (Video)

The voracious little creature above has an endless appetite and needs to be feed regularly, basically non-stop, otherwise it's likely to turn into a real life clone of the Gremlins. But, as it turns out, his creator, animator, rigger, screen play writer, and voice talent (yes, he really is that multi-talented) is currently out of a job. 

Because he's a good friend, and also because he has a passion for robots that rivals our own, we're showcasing a couple video samples of his work below in hopes that one of our readers might be interested in putting his talents to work, or would be kind enough to point him in the right direction. Even if you're not in the market for an amazingly talented creative type, check out the videos anyway - they're a blast, and extremely well executed..

Robots Take to the Water Like a Duck (Video)

Over the weekend we finished writing an in-depth magazine article on Mega Dynamizer, the 50 cm, 5.0 kg ROBO-ONE humanoid robot champion designed by Sugiura-san. One of the main themes of the article was the Sugiura Family's desire to create robots that can productively share the world with their human counterparts in a symbiotic manner complementing each others strengths and weaknesses.

We were so impressed, that we couldn't stop talking about what they are doing, probably to the point of overwhelming our friends with our bubbling enthusiasm. Then, over coffee yesterday, one of our friends asked if the Sugiura robots could swim....

At first, that question really threw us for a bit of a loop. We've seen their robots fight in the ring, do back flips, climb stairs, run an obstacle course, ski down a snow covered hill, and catch fish with a fishing pole and tackle. But, we had never seen one of them swimming around in the water, until tonight...

RoboGames 2007: Gold Metal Robot Builder Interview - Chris Farrell (Video)

We're always fascinated by the way that people are motivated and excited by robotics, so when we recently had the opportunity to interview double RoboGames metal winner, Chris Farrell of Farrell Robotics, we immediately jumped at the chance.

Chris, and his dad - Rob, have done some surprising work developing Oro and Zog - their competitive robots - completely from scratch, to the point that between them they won a total of four metals at RoboGames 2007 in San Francisco last month - Gold and Silver in Wrestling along with Silver and Bronze in the Biped Race.

Chris was kind enough to share their story with us, along with a lot of insight into their motivation and dreams.  

RoboGames 2007: Making New Friends

There are many benefits to attending, or participating, in events like RoboGames. Of course there's the chance to experience exciting robot competitions up-close and personal, and to be inspired by robots that you could never begin to imagine sitting in your easy chair at home. But, in our opinion, the most important and valuable benefit is the opportunity to meet others that are just as passionate about robotics - to make new friends, share opinions, laugh at each other's jokes, exchange experiences and information, and establish strong lasting relationships.

RoboGames 2007 last month was no exception. Finally we got to put faces with the names, and forum nicknames/handles, of people we knew from online robot forums like RoboSavvy. And, we got to make a lot new friends that are as devoted to advancing and promoting robotics as a hobby, and as a career, as we are. A great example is Johnny Williams from Boss Robot Hobby. Johnny was kind enough to explain why he's so dedicated to robots, and to his customers.

Crabfu's KHR-2HV Robot - Progress Report (Video)

 
A few days ago, we posted about I-Wei's (Crabfu) progress in creating motions for his new Kondo KHR-2HV robot. Today he released a new progress report video (see below) documenting a few of the robots latest moves.

With his animation background, and experience in building steam robots with complex linkages, he's been able to generate some surprisingly realistic motion sequences, and he's doing it using a totally stock robot and only the standard Heart to Heart 3 software that comes with the kit. As soon as he feels comfortable with the robots performance, we're going to see if he will share some of his techniques and insight with the rest of us humanoid robot fans.

Optimus Prime Shows Defiance to Crowds in Ohio (Video)

Oops, we mistyped that headline. It should have read, "Optimus Prime Shows Off to Crowds in Defiance, Ohio."

Last weekend, Defiance, the hometown of Matt and Jen Bauer of Bauer Independents, and birthplace of Rook's Pawn, was anxiously awaiting the upcoming opening of the new Transformers movie on the Fourth of July. Matt knew that a small town like Defiance, located in the heart of the mid-West wasn't likely to draw any of the movie's stars to the opening, so he decided to take matters into his own hands.

In the matter of just a few days, and a few long nights,  he completely converted Jen's Robonova-1 robot into the spitting image of Optimus Prime!

RoboGames 2007 - Alan Downing's Autonomous Robot Bear

There was more to RoboGames than the ear deafening noise and chaos of combat robots trying their utmost to disable or destroy each other - much, much more. Taking the opportunity to check out all the nooks and crannies of the Fort Mason facility we discovered lots of non-violent and simply delightful robots and their enthusiastic creators.

One of our personal favorites was the "PoohBearBot" - the work of Alan Downing, a manager at a large Silicon Valley software company, and an active member of the famous Home Brew Robotics Club. Alan was kind enough to spend some time explaining the robot to us, and patiently responding to our questions.

Robot Demonstrates Asimov's 1st Law of Robotics

Asimov's 1st Law of Robotics states, "A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm." That 'law' came into play a few nights ago when Matt Bauer was walking down a path in the dark carrying his ROBO-ONE class custom designed and built humanoid robot - Rook's Pawn.

Interview with I-Wei Huang, the Amazing Steam Robot Builder (Video)

After seeing I-Wei Huang's most recent steam robot creation "R2S2" on the internet, we felt compelled to learn more. Not only was he willing to answer our questions, and explain the whole build process including some tough challenges, he was also kind enough to provide a special video (see below) that includes the initial robot setup process and the robot in action -

Lem: The R2S2 design is really impressive. It was obviously done with a lot of attention to detail, care, and a real appreciation of the robot itself. Have you always been a fan of Star Wars and R2-D2?

I-Wei: Yes, I am an original StarWars fan. Actually, Star Wars was my first exposure to robots, and like many people, R2-D2 was my favorite character in the movie. Decades passed, and I started making steampunk inspired machines. I was always on the look out for unique ways to make use of this old form of power. R2 was a no brainer, I knew that sooner or later I had to attempt it.

Robot Builder Profile: Jin Sato Part 2 - The HRP-2m Choromet Robot (Video)

Modeled after it's larger brother, the famous HRP-2 Promet humanoid robot developed at the Japan Advanced Industrial Science and Technology Institute (AIST), the HRP-2m Choromet robot is smaller in size, yet retains a lot of the functionality and performance at a fraction of the cost.

Starting with the Promet example, and taking advantage of a technology transfer of core software from AIST, Chromet was developed by joint cooperation between the institute and four private companies. And, it turns out that Jin Sato played a key role in the design, programming, and release of the robot for sale. When we visited Jin at his workshop in Tsukuba recently, he fired up one of the Choromet robots and put it through its paces for our camera.

Robot Builder Profile: Jin Sato - Part 1 (Video)

It's been a while since we published one of our 'Robot Builder Profiles', so we thought it's about time that we made up for our shortcoming by posting a series of interviews with one of the best - Jin Sato.

"Jin-san", as he is often referred to by friends here in Japan, is a world class humanoid robot designer and a top ROBO-ONE competitor. Over the past five years he built ten completely new humanoids, an average of two per year, from the ground up. In many cases, he did all the design and hardware fabrication as well as developing the controller electronics and supporting software.

We'll delve into some of his educational, humanoid, and other robotic, projects in upcoming posts, but we thought the most appropriate place to start would be with his earlier LEGO Mindstorms creations, especially his 'MIBO' dog robot clone of Sony's popular AIBO. In the video interview below, Jin demonstrates the original MIBO robot while explaining some of the the robots design features, and why he took on such a daunting challenge.

Flashback: Modifications to One of the First KHR-1 Humanoid Robots in Europe

Over two years ago, one of the very first Kondo KHR-1 humanoid robots found its way to Europe and was purchased by Michael (aka "Meltdown" on the popular Robosavvy Robot forums). Not only was Michael able to successfully assemble, test, and program the robot, he also proceeded to extensively hack and improve upon it.

Michael is currently considering upgrading the robots controller to the new RCB3 board from Kondo. But before he tackles that conversion, he was kind enough to share some great photos and the details of his KHR-1 modifications.

Robot Builder Profile: Roger Mertin - Founder, Mobiru Micro

Robots are great, no question - we love them. At the same time, we always try to keep in mind that behind every robot there's a human designer, and behind everyone of those human designers there's an interesting story. We're interested in new, innovative robot designs, and we're just as interested in hearing what motivates their designers to create them. In some small sense, if we can understand what motivates passionate robot creators, then perhaps we can clone and proliferate the process.

So, when we were recently alerted to some really slick robots being designed by a small startup company named "Mobiru Micro Inc.", we decided to chat with the company's founder, Roger Mertin, to see what makes him, and his robots, tick. Roger was extremely open and frank with us, and even gave us permission to use some of his photos for this report.

Exclusive Interview with Bruno Maisonnier - Founder, Aldebaran Robotics

Aldebaran is one of the brightest stars in the night sky, and because of it's position in the constellation Taurus, it's often referred to as the "Bull's Eye." Aldebaran is also the name of one of the most interesting, and potentially 'brightest' robotics start-up companies we know. They have drawn a large target on the humanoid robot market, and plan to hit it dead center in the bullseye with NAO, their innovative, fully autonomous robot next year. 

Of course, we've been extremely curious about the NAO project ever since we first caught wind of it a few months ago. Although it's still too early to disclose a lot of the robot's specifics, Bruno Maisonnier, the founder of Aldebaran Robotics, was kind enough to frankly, openly, and very patiently, answer our long list of questions in the exclusive interview below.

Microsoft Robotics Studio/Simulation - Interview with Laurent Lessieux (Video) Part 1

It's been quite a few months since Microsoft first went public with their new Robotics Studio development platform last June, so we were curious to find out how the pre-beta software is progressing, what features and benefits really appeal to the early testers, and what kind of problems they've run into.

By an interesting coincidence, one of the robot and simulation guru's currently evaluating the platform, Laurent Lessieux, happens to live not too far from us - only a two hour train ride, and even better, his primary interest is to use the platform with humanoid robots. Perfect! So early Monday morning we hopped on the bullet train headed North to Utsunomiya to see what Laurent could share with us.

Joe, Mike, And Robo-Basho: Making The Dream Real

Tug McGraw, the famous major league baseball pitcher, hit the nail right on the head when he said, "Ya gotta believe." Dreaming is fine - we all do a lot of it. Yet, to turn your dream into a reality you have to believe at deep levels that you can actually do it. Today, in the field of engineering and robotics, more and more young people, and the adults working with them, are developing the critical beliefs and confidence to literally go out and change the world.

We wanted to find out more about how this dramatic turn-around is taking place, and the impact it's having on the people involved. So we tracked down Joseph 'Joe' Johnson, the Chief Technologist and Co-Founder of Robotic Amusements, and asked him to share his experience and insight.

Joe told us a great story involving the FIRST organization, great mentors and role models, having the courage to quit his job in the automotive industry to found a new robotics company with his partner Mike, developing Robo-Basho - a new robot sumo arcade game, and how they plan to actively support and contribute to the robotics community.

Rapid Robot Evolution - Rook's Pawn

It's amazing how quickly time zooms by, and how fast robots evolve. Early this year - yes, we're talking about early 2006, Matt Bauer was working on his stock Hitec Robonova-1 humanoid robot kit and happened to run across the Robosavvy website and forum. He signed up as a member and made his first forum post on Sunday,  February 05, 2006.

He's come a long, long way since then. And, in just under two weeks he and his wife will take his robot on another long and exciting journey. This time they're all getting on a plane to compete in the ROBO-ONE 10 competition in Japan against some of the top humanoid robot builders in the world. 

Rook's Pawn (and Matt) Featured In Robot Magazine!

Rook's Pawn, the awesome and heavily modified Robonova-1 based robot created by Matt Bauer is the subject of a multiple page feature article in the latest issue of Robot Magazine. Our copy of the magazine won't find its way to Japan for a few weeks, but we're told that the magazine will be on news stands and in bookstores in the US and Canada starting on August 1st.

ROBO-ONE Robots: The First Dynamizer

With only 53 days left on the calendar before ROBO-ONE 10 kicks off in mid-September, we've been watching a lot of activity on the weblogs of ROBO-ONE robot builders. Most of them are busy tearing down, rebuilding, testing, and sometimes completely redesigning their robots. It's not unusual for them to do a completely new design in the six months between the major competitions here in Japan.

So, that lead us to wonder about the actual lifespan of a top ROBO-ONE robot. A professional human athlete can expect to compete for at least a few years, and sometimes for a decade or more. In contrast, ROBO-ONE as a robot sport is around four years old at most, but some of the robots have been redesigned as many as 10 times in that short span.

Coming Soon: Interview with Eiichiro Morinaga

Eiichiro Morinaga, the creator of Metallic Fighter, explains how ROBO-ONE compares to robot sumo and micromouse, why he finds all three robo-sports so motivating, and his life-long passion for robotics.

The Story Behind The Story: Mobile Robots - Jeanne Dietsch

Robots are neat - no question, and we love working with them as much as anyone - maybe more. The only thing we like better is the people behind the robots. Understanding what makes a robot tick is fun. Understanding what makes a robot creator tick is an absolute blast. So, when Jeanne Dietsch dropped by Robots Dreams (electronically) we jumped at the chance to hear the story behind Mobile Robots.

Robots Meet Eye To Eye - Robonova Checks Out The Robosapien (Video)

After his great initial experience with the Robonova-1, Matt Bauer just couldn't leave well enough alone or sit back to rest on his laurels. He just had to hack his brand new robot, and what better hack than to give it the gift of sight? And, if you hack your robot to add vision, then it has to have an appropriate 'target'. . .

More on the X-VEAAT Robot (New Video)

In response to our earlier post about the X-VEAAT robot created by Ionitron, "human" at earth.com wrote in to ask, "Interesting, but it's not clear from the video if the wheels are powered or not. I would like to see it "drive around" in addition to flexing it's legs. By-the-way, wasn't R2-D2 a robot with legs+wheels?"

Great observation. So, we did a little research and came up with another really interesting video of the robot in action that should clearly answer his first request. . .

Robot Builder Profile: Matt Bauer and the Robonova-1 (Video)

There's tremendous interest in bipedal robots, especially since the KHR-1 and Robonova-1 robot kits have been featured recently on television and in major publications. We've been getting a lot of questions asking how difficult the kits are, and what it takes to actually put one together. So, we tracked down Matt Bauer who just finished putting assembling his first bipedal robot - a Robonova-1 - and asked him to share his experiences with all of you. 

Robot Builder Profile: Ionitron and the X-VEAAT Robot (Video)

Every robot designer and experimenter faces design trade-offs. For example, should our robot  have legs, or wheels, or even tank tractor treads? Most of us don't even consider the possibility of designing a robot that incorporates the best from several different design approaches. But Ionitron, an inspiring robot developer from Spain, did exactly that, and created a really amazing robot - the X-VEAAT.

From LEGOS to Rough Terrian to Deep Space

We really enjoy prototyping new concepts and ideas with LEGO Mindstorms. It’s fast, easy, and keeps us from investing a lot of time and effort in a lame-brained idea (yes, we do have plenty of them,  we just don’t talk about them . . .). So, it’s always great to see other robot experimenters taking the same approach – like Chris Schur’s SkidBot and GeoBot-1.

Ken Does It Again!

Just before Halloween, Ken Finch shared two of his Robopet mods with us. One mod added a LED mode indicator to our favorite robot dog, while the other added a second IR detector so that you could operate the Robopet no matter which way it was facing. Since then, Ken got his hands on a brand new Robosapien V2, and . . .

Robot Builder Profile: Team Cosmos - Champion Robot Builders

We're kicking off a series of Robot Builder Profile articles featuring - guess what? Robot Builders!

The first profile features Team Cosmos, responsible for combat robots that have stacked up an unbelievable string of competition wins, and consistently bring home the bacon, and the trophies.