ArtBot

ODOI project featured on 3ders.org and relayed on Flipboard

Thank you to 3ders.org for publishing an article on the ODOI project!

The article is available is entitled "3D printed walking robot expresses human-like movement and moods"

Besides the article has been relayed on Flipboad 3D printing section as well:

Some stylized pics of the robot

You will find below some stylized pictures of the robot with different postures

The first one is the robot taking a rest - sideway leaning against a wall:

New video - ODOI Robot taking a rest - sideway leaning against a wall

I am programming the robot to mimic some of the postures we (as human being) exhibit in our daily life. Program some of these mundane postures and trigger them at the appropriate moment can really surprise the audience.  Sit, get up from a chair or a bench, take an object, walk with different moods, leaning against a wall, crossing an obstacle… are some of the postures I am studying.

Today I focus on “rest against a wall”. There are many ways to lean against a wall: contact with the wall through your back or your foot. Also, there is the sideways way of leaning against the same wall where the contact with the wall is achieve though the shoulder or the hand.

The video below shows the example “sideway leaning against the wall – contact with the hand”.

ODOI project viewed on intorobotics Website

A description of the ODOI project is available on IntoRobotics a wellknow website discussing robotics news and DIY projects. Thanks Dragos.

A walking gait for a depressed robot

I wanted to create a new gait that you will not find anywhere, a gait for a “depressive robot” (well the robot is not depressed of course, it just imitate the posture of a depressive person).

It is also an interesting research work because one have to coordinate the whole body in order to create an emotion from the audience. Besides it is a good opportunity to play with the articulated torso of the robot.

Unfortunately I cannot like cartoonists, exaggerate all the postures in order to create amazing walking gaits and create stories around them.

But for a first tentative I am quite satisfied - yes always good to congratulate myself ;)

Improvements on the straight walk and new turning gait video available

New video on the Straight walk gait

This video shows some important improvements with respect to Video 2: no more fast movements of the torso during heel strike and smoother transitions from one phase to another.

More details on the walking gait computation.

Over the last months, I redesigned some parts of the robot (see Figure 1), mainly:

• The Pelvic and the brackets “linked to the Pelvic” are made with aluminum. Initially the Pelvic and related brackets were made of resin, but because of the torque exerted by the servos and the weight of the robot, they bent which lead to difference in terms of angles (Pelvic in Sagittal plane to be precise) between the simulator and the real robot. The use of aluminum solved the problem
• The lower part of the leg and the foot in order to change the distribution of weight.

Two New videos more compelling

Here are two new videos I want to share. The first video shows the robot walking at real speed.  The gait is quite stable and the video shows two cycles and the second part focus on the legs movements.

As mentioned before the gait I implemented is different from the one used by most of the existing humanoid robots. Here the gait implements a heel strike, a forefoot push and the stance leg is straight during the swing phase. In other words, the robot never keeps the knees bent.

 

The second video shows the same sequence but a speed 4 times faster, it is interesting because  it looks more "natural and/or more smooth" I will say.

 

I will post a note describing the robot and how I implemented the gait very soon

 

First video of ODOI

Here is the first video of ODOI doing its first steps:

 

There are really a lot of room for improvements here but I wanted to make public the video anyway and consider it as a milestone and then, we can measure the progress.

The main point is that the gait I am working one, based on an articulated foot and a passive articulated heel, is validated. The robot is working almost like a human being without bending the knees al the time like robots using gaits based on ZMP. In this way, the gait I propose is quite novative.

The most difficult part is the lateralization and the control of the upper body which is jiggling a lot as you can see on the video.

 

Mass distribution and the need for new actuators

I wanted to write this article to highlight the difference of mass distribution between humans and humanoid robots (small to medium size) in order to highlight the difference and the consequences in terms of control and the need for new actuators dedicated to humanoid robots.