RoboTokyo

The Arneis robot arm is equipped with a marker pen, to perform writing and drawing actions.  It can produce several thousand portraits a day (it’s not all about clean tech entrepreneurs) and share it’s creations with the audience (as seen in the video above).

The robot receive input from a camera eye and draws whatever is seen thorough the camera. Portrait artists look out Arneis is coming to a street corner near you soon…

The washing-up is piling up in the kitchen, you are too tired to get up and make dinner or even just grab a beer - do not fear! Those crazy Robots from Japan are here. They will take care of your cooking needs, supply you with drinks and even wake you up for work…Here are five robots every lazy person wishes they could command!

1. Motoman Robot: Fancy breakfast in bed? Robots could soon be taking over kitchens up and down the country if the impressive Motoman is anything to go by. The industrial robot expertly flipped and cooked a Japanese pancake on a hotplate during a demonstration at an exhibition in Osaka. Built by engineers from the Japanese giant Yaskawa Electric, the SDA10 has ‘human-like’ flexibility of movement. Both its arms can work together or independently and the robot can operate in confined spaces. The Motoman robot can also be used for more traditional tasks such as assembling and packaging items as heavy as 20kg as well as complex handling that could once only be done by people.

2. Kitchen Robot: Professors at Tokyo University have developed a robot that can help out around the house. Its movements are jerky and not very fast, but this robot can pour a cup of tea and even wash the cup afterwards. Because really, if you’re gonna invest four years of your life into a robot, your primary goal should be getting it to do the least exciting things possible. Why not build a robot that sits in a chair and reads a book?

   


3. Twendy-One Robot: Have trouble getting out of bed in the morning? Japanese scientists have developed a robot who can help you do just that - AND bring breakfast to your table. The 17-stone robot called Twendy-One was developed at Waseda University in Tokyo. Built with arms and hands the size ‘of an average adult female’, Twendy has enough strength to support humans as they sit up and stand, and can pick up and manipulate delicate objects such as a drinking straw.

4. El E Robot: The nuances and imprecise nature of human language pose big challenges for developers looking to advance voice control technology of helper robots, but researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology have found an effective way to circumvent verbal communication by instructing a robot to fetch items under direction of a laser pointer.

5. ApriAttenda Robot: Japanese society is already hedging its bets in the face of a rapidly declining population with the promise of robot workers. The latest addition to Japan’s emerging service class is the updated version of the ApriAttenda, created by Toshiba. At just one meter tall, the robot can open doors, handle trays and drinks and comes equipped with cameras in its three-fingered hands. The robot is expected to join the ranks of day care and nursing robots being designed to meet the needs of the graying populace. Shown below is the ApriAttenda being trained by one of the humans it will soon replace.

Info From 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5

Looking Good! Soundwave, Devastator & Jetfire are all confirmed to be in Transformers 2.

Even though I can’t wait to see the new The Day the Earth Stood Still and see the updated Gort terrorize us with his planet love, the film will be overshadowed by the lameness of: Keanu Reeves.
No matter how many microbots Gort becomes, his shiny metal coolness will still be overpowered by the pure evil of Keanus’ acting.
Why can’t we just have a whole film of robot induced destruction and no Reeves? why…

The Tokyo toy show is in full swing and we are not there …….aarggh!

The i-sobot @ 2.28 looks like it is going to be a big deal when released (hype?). The one shown in the video is the standard edition which is available any day now ($258). There is also a cam i-sobot scheduled for release in October. It can send pics to your PC or phone via WiFi and is voice activated ($344).

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Meet HRP-3 Promet Mk-II from Kawada Industries. A robot which will eventually replace many manual jobs performed by humans today. On the market for a cool $3 million he can handle rain, slippery surface, use tools.

The math doesn’t ad up but still would be very cool to have a robot workforce. Wait we have that already we are the robotic workforce!!!

Unplug Now……….

Great video on Robot Culture in Japan by TokyoEye. Info on where to buy your robot kits in Tokyo and where to meet up with other robot otaku enthusiasts. Also features quite possibly the coolest arcade robot game you have ever seen.

Hasbro are releasing a series of toy electronics that turn into robots known as the ‘The Real Gear Transfomers’ ala Soundwave style as a tie in with the Transformer Movie (release date July 4th).

Some real world functionality wouldn’t have gone a miss ie: the camera turning into a usb webcam (one for the toy mashup/homebrew makers). From what I can find on the Transformers website they will be relased same day as the Movie itself. Source - Engadget

Meet ‘Miuro‘ (music innovation based on utility robot technology). The new Japanese robot from ZMP. It twists and rolls to iPod tunes in an intricate dance based on complex mathmatics (chaos theory). What makes it special is that it’s dancing isn’t preprogrammed, but generated by the robot in real time in sync with the music it is playing via the iPod player that locks into the machine.

The cool stuff….Miuro can be programmed like an alarm clock so it wheels into the bedroom and blasts music at a certain time.

Miuro will use built-in sensors to seek out people to play tunes to.

It can stream music from your computer…

How much ? Miuro is currently only for sale in Japan but should be coming to the West for the fourth quater with an expected retail value of $850 (£425).

The thought of Miuro wheeling into the bedroom and streaming Limbiq Frequencies at 7.00 in the morning is too much. I will defintly be buying one of these.

This is yet another dinosaur robot which will be a big hitter this Christmas. It has a retail value of $200 (£100) and is the brainchild of Caleb Chung the creator of the furby.

What sets this robotic dinasaur from the rest is it’s range of activities and emotions that can be modified via online software. Emotions include - nipping, coughing, yawning, snoring, expressing joy, anger and fear….

Ugobe (the toy producer) proclaim it to be “the first truly autonomous life-form.” They are wrong in thinking this as I am!