MANOI’s Motions

Posted by Erin, the RobotGrrl on Tuesday, March 31st, 2009

These were MANOI’s *new* motions, before the power transformer died.

I added arm movements to the skating movements, which makes it look a bit more realistic! If you notice, the arms are not just moving forwards and backwards, but they also move in and out.

My parents bought me two LiPo 11V 2300mAh batteries (and a charger) with 2-day shipping so that I can have it in time for the weekend!

MANOI’s Motions from RobotGrrl on Vimeo.

Posted in: MANOI, Projects, Robot.

Book Review – Exilium by Richard Evans

Posted by Erin, the RobotGrrl on Saturday, March 28th, 2009

The connection between reality and literature is often emphasized in the field of robotics. When it comes to robotics and ethics, Isaac Asimov’s Three Laws of Robotics are a standard. Everyone uses them to compare what should be created and what should not be created, and how much freedom there will be for robots and humans. Although it may not seem like it now, Frankenstein was a common influence for early robotics. It, along with the Tin Man from The Wizard of Oz, established the standard of what robots should look like in North American society. In Japan, robots were first introduced as creatures who wish to aid humanity through an anime cartoon art form. This observation, has caused a major division in the sense of robots. They can either harm, or they can help. Never both.

In the book Exilium, by Richard Evans, these two differences intertwine, creating a science fiction story that is interesting to read for any roboticist and/or hobbyist. The main story is about two robots that can care for each other, who are separated by a convolution of events. The robots are human-like, due to advance behavioural AI systems that enable the robot to have emotions.

Behavioural AI interests me, as well as many others in the robot community. BubbleBoy, one of my robots, was created for the sole purpose of testing behavioural algorithms to try to create emotions. There was an extremely interesting passage during the book that illustrates the emotions established by Kim, a robot, for Alex, another robot.

Cold. It’s so cold in here.
She pulled her hand away, stung by the Plast-Ice, fingers quick to her mouth, as if trying to hold the words that were lost forever. She saw the fracture at the back of his head.
“Oh, Alex.”
She felt herself sinking in a great dark sea. Tears flowed and soaked into the black veil across her face.

You can see that Kim senses that it is cold, and again senses a fracture in Alex’s head. However, since she has emotions, Alex has a special meaning to her, which triggers an emotional reaction. This passage makes one wonder if there will be emotional robots in the future, and what one could expect from them. Humans have emotions, and one of our greatest faults is acting upon these emotions. Will robots end up the same way? Would emotions influence the decisions made by robots, especially when it comes to decisions that are borderline of breaking the Three Laws of Robotics?

This piece of literature by Richard Evans allows one to observe what the advancement and creation of complex behavioural AI might lead to. By questioning these observations, we as a robot community, can be sure that the proper questions are raised in order to build ethical, yet fun, robots. If you’re interested in a book that will allow you to envision the future of robotics and AI, while being entertained by a robotic action quest, this is the book for you.

Here are some links to check out:
Richard Evans Online
Exilium on Amazon.com
Uncanny Valley

A big thank you to Figo Books who sent me the book so I could read and review it.

Posted in: Art, Other, Projects.

Friday Night Robotics – Ninja Turtle MANOI

Posted by Erin, the RobotGrrl on Friday, March 27th, 2009

My primary goal of this FNR was to start getting MANOI ready for the RoboGames.

I made motion models of MANOI running in my notebook (I like to do motion modeling on paper, just like AI), and coded it into Arduino.

The new motions didn’t really make a running motion, however the results were quite funny. I will post a video later of it.

The next part that I worked on was MANOI’s shell. Originally, two years ago when I bought MANOI, I wanted a white shell. I’ve changed my mind since then, and I wanted a green and blue shell.

I used the same paint that I use on my Styrobots!

I used two coats of paint on each shell part to make it look nice and green!

Eyes are blue!

I was going to do the entire shell, but it was getting too hot in the room. This is the end result:

It looks like a ninja turtle!

Posted in: Art, MANOI, Other, Programming, Projects, Robot.

FIRST Chesapeake Regional 2009

Posted by Erin, the RobotGrrl on Friday, March 20th, 2009

Down at the US Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland, this regional competition was interesting.

There weren’t that many teams, and the field house was extremely smaller compared to RIT.

I didn’t like how they had to check everyone’s ID. I had to carry around my SEVIS + Passport + Medicare card + Insurance + University ID everywhere. It was super annoying! It also felt like we couldn’t really cheer or ‘have fun’ because the Navy would kick us out.

There was a funny part on Day 2 where the head of the Naval Academy (or something like that) was invited to be a judge. He talked about stuff, then he mentioned UAVs. I let out a woop and start clapping, and everyone looks at me like as if I’m weird!

This is the part that I dislike about FIRST. Robots are not RC cars. In FIRST, they are, and they completely overshadow REAL robotics, like UAVs! No one knew what a UAV was. I was shocked! UAVs are an amazing part of Robotics. FIRST should try to outreach more to real robotics.

229 made it to Quarter Finals.

It felt like we were all missing something that we had in Rochester. Maybe more energy. Traveling from Montreal to Annapolis in one day was too much. The rest of the group traveled from Potsdam to Annapolis in 2 days, but it is still a long and tiring trip.

Here’s some photos!

My favourite part of it all was when we all were singing Sweet Caroline!

They played the Soulja Boy song, and no one danced to it, to my surprise! I almost died of laughter.

Posted in: Projects, School.

FIRST Finger Lakes Regional 2009 – Photos

Posted by Erin, the RobotGrrl on Monday, March 9th, 2009

As per my previous post, there was most definitely more than just words to this entire competition!

It was in Rochester, New York at RIT. The fieldhouse was quite large, which provided a big enough dancefloor for the HS students.

I feel that the playing field for the robots wasn’t big enough. The robots should be smaller. THere wasn’t enough room for them to move or do anything!

This was our robot. I didn’t really help in designing it, but I helped in getting it set up and making some tweaks.

The games were pretty intense, sometimes. We got disqualified from one match because a zip tie was sticking out, and another match we got “static” from crashing into the boards. We made it to semi-finals! Here’s a picture of our alliance drive teams.

And… a picture of the entire team! Woohoo

Just the mentors (I’m on the right)

That was a pretty fun weekend!

Posted in: Projects, School.

FIRST Finger Lakes Regional 2009

Posted by Erin, the RobotGrrl on Sunday, March 8th, 2009

On March 6th and 7th I was able to experience a FIRST Robotics Competition hands on for the first time! Our team, 229 Division by Zero, competed at the Finger Lakes Regional (FLR) competition in Rochester, NY at RIT.

It was interesting. Since I didn’t really know what to expect, I didn’t have many assigned responsibilities other than to figure out what I wanted to do. There are two main options of things you can do when you are a team mentor:
1) Scouting
2) Helping out in the pit

Scouting is recording all of the statistics of human players on different teams. You have to sit up in the stands with all of your fellow scouters, and record the data. I tried this once and had to bail, I find it hard enough to focus on one robot at a time, let alone count the flying moon rocks from a human player AND see if they go in or not.

Helping out in the pit is mainly what I did. If there was a nut that came loose but couldn’t be reached, I’d help fix it. Programming errors, electrical problems. That sort of stuff. When we got into the elimination round, I helped check to see what battery is most full, and bring it back to the playing field. I must say, I think we were the most well-equipped team with batteries!

It was a great competition! I enjoyed the elimination round very much. We made it to semi-finals, which is quite an achievement! We’re sponsored by the university’s SPEED program, and I’m pretty sure we don’t have any other sponsors. There are some teams out there who are sponsored by NASA!

My main concern though was that it didn’t really feel like a robotics competition, but more or less like a RC car competition. I expect a robotics competition to have AI, and to actually have robotics involved. For this competition, all the parts were machined precisely, and everything was planned out. It just did not feel like a competition of robots.

I was expecting more autonomous, which would make it feel more like a robotics competition. The fact that most of the excitement stemmed from the human players and not the “robots” also enervated me. No one really ‘cared’ about how well the robot was designed. In fact, during the gameplay, it wasn’t really the robots that scored most of the points, it was the human players. How ironic is that?

Maybe it was just a poor game this year. The whole smooth surfaces thing was somewhat cheesy, in my opinion.

I had one notable problem there. I didn’t bring safety glasses, so I always borrowed from the table set up at the entrance to the pits. However, there was one shift where it was not an ordinary person lending out the glasses.

This lady denied me safety glasses!

Yes, this is true! Denied safety glasses! Can there possibly anything more stupid than that? There was a box full with safety glasses! I totally felt like reaching over the table and strangling her, but I didn’t. Instead, I ‘explained’ to her that I always borrowed glasses from here. Eventually the conversation became so ridiculous that I just went in the pit with no safety glasses on. The end of this all was that I ended up borrowing glasses from someone on the team.

My first FIRST competition, and I’m denied safety glasses. Not the best impression… shame on them.

I also was not very enthused how FIRST mentioned the economy and lots of other political mumbo-jumbo in their opening ceremony, and… well, basically during the entire competition.

However, it was fun. It was different. I enjoyed it! Our next competition is in Annapolis, Maryland. Hopefully we will pull off a victory!

Posted in: Projects, School.

MANOI’s Last Tune-up (Servos)

Posted by Erin, the RobotGrrl on Tuesday, March 3rd, 2009

The servo extension cables from RobotShop USA arrived sometime! I’m not sure exactly when, because I don’t check my snail mail every day… heh!

Oh yeah… if RobotShop reads my blog… thank you for sending all of the ridiculous amount of styrofoam squiggles. You could have used an insulated envelope, but no… squiggles! Hahahaha =)

Hopefully this will be MANOI’s last tune-up! Then I will have to start thinking about the battery… RoboGames is quickly approaching!! (Which means I’ll also have to start thinking about fundraising as well! (it won’t be too bad, about 1/2 the price of the Stanford trip I wager!))

One of the main flaws of MANOI was all of there servo connections… it just was not good!

The way I originally laid out the board was that one side would be for the legs, one side would be for the arms. I am still keeping it this way. This is what it looked like after the leg side was redone:

This is the arm side:

All in all, much more neat. I eliminated the clumsy extension cables that I had before. Look at how much nicer it is!

I am extremely pleased. I used one of the servo extensions for RX and Ground for the SSC-32. This way they won’t keep falling out and bending pins.

In my opinion, there is even room for an Arduino Pro Mini in there now, and MANOI would have hardly any bulk on its back. I did not test the servos yet, nor did I test the skating motions. (I had to go to class) I’m interested to see how the center of gravity changed.

Maybe putting an Arduino pro mini in there would be a good idea… and just have right-angle headers on it, with jumpers going to the wave shield. I think that would be efficient! Hmm!! Exciting!

Posted in: MANOI, Projects, Robot.