GoRobotics - Robotics news, robot projects

Archive for May, 2008

Update from the WallE Builders Group

Posted on May 5th, 2008 in Hobbyist

walle_biulders_group.jpg Both Jawa Lunk and Scot Washburn have sent us some cool updates from the Wall-E builders group. For those not familiar with the Wall-E builder’s group, it’s an array of hobbiets that are building scale models of Wall-E, the star of the upcoming Pixar film about a robot named Wall-E.

The group currently has over 600 members who have, "grouped together to build a real working, 1:1 scale Wall-E from Disney / Pixar’s latest movie which isn’t even in theaters until the end of June 2008."

The group is making good progress with building several Wall-E models, including the "Game Cube" Wall-E model, by Jawa Lunk.

Reader Scot Washburn sent us some pictures from his Wall-E model:

 

walle_model.jpg


walle_eyes1.jpg


You can find plenty more cool Wall-E models on the Wall-E Builder’s Group Flickr page.

 


(more…)

Science Friday Does Robots

Posted on May 4th, 2008 in Latest News

The Automaton blog is reporting the NPR featured robots on its weekly "Science Friday" talk show.

Can’t find anyone to hang out with? Maybe you should invite a robot into your home. In this segment, Ira and guests talk about developing robots with personalities — moving on beyond the mechanical arms found in today’s factories, to devices that could interact with people on a social level.

According to Automaton,

Guests include Helen Greiner (chair and co-founder of iRobot), Peter McOwen (a computer science professor from Queen Mary, University of London), Dean Kamen (inventor of the iBot, Segway, and founder of FIRST), and Grant Cox (member of FIRST champion team The Thunder Chickens).


I haven’t had a chance to listen yet, so let me know what you think.


 


(more…)

RoboTurK Takes Video of Emergency Sites

Posted on May 1st, 2008 in Latest News
The RoboTurK system, based on Microsoft Robotics Studio, is designed to be an autonomous system for taking video surveillance of emergency areas. The motivation fur such a system is events like the 1999 earthquake in Turkey, which took the lives of over 45,000 people. The RoboTurK system will enable emergency crews to quickly assess the damage even when communication systems break down.
RobotTurk is a prototype Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV) equipped with a
camera that is capable of streaming live video of disaster struck
areas to ground command stations. The helicopter carries onboard an
eBox compute-unit that runs Microsoft Robotics Studio, allowing the
robot to execute specific command issued by ground station or to
auto-fly or safely land.

The system is designed around a standard RC helicopter and uses Microsoft Virtual Earth for mapping and to display realtime video of a location.

You can keep up with the progress of the RoboTurK project at their website.

(more…)

Subscribe to the RobotShop Blogs RSS feed!

Enter your email address: