A.R.T.E.P.P: the Animatronic
This project was submitted for my senior capstone project. The idea was to create a robotic puppet that could be controlled or manipulated in real time. The face, which would be projected onto the animatronic, was mapped to the operator's face and would "speak" and "blink as the operator did. Similarly, the arms would move to mirror the arm motions of the operator. Though glitchy and far from finished, it achieves the goals I set out to accomplish.
Click here for a video of A.R.T.E.P.P. or here for more detailed documentation and information.
Sleepy, the Screaming Robot
When discussing robots, the conversation generally focuses around utility or emulation of the human form. Seldom do we discover arguments for their artistic usage (although their performative value has been noted). For this project, I wanted to make a useless, annoying robot that would "scream" when exposed to light, and otherwise served no purpose whatsoever. I had the great honor to display this automaton at the Shanghai Maker Carnival 2016. For a link to the article about my project, click here.
Solar Pet
For this project, I was tasked with craeting a simple solar mechanism that acted as a "pet". So, using the awesome facilities of digital fabraction available to me, I began my journey to create just such a solar pet.
For a link to the article about my project, click here.
Messy Bessy, the Photovore
By the most rigorous definition of a Robot, we can infer that it should be autonomous and self sufficient to a degree. The challenge in this project was therefore to design a robot that was not only capable of motion and the ability to navigate, but could also act to continually power itself. This "photovore" was solar powered, and could theoretically move to places with ambient sunlight to charge istelf. During the day, it would roll to places with sunlight and charge, while at night, it would "sleep" and wait till the next day to feed itself again.