On the Gripping Hand 162
eek_the_kat writes "The Sensor Fusion Project at Ishikawa Hashimoto Laboratory has developed a high speed visual feedback system called SPE-256. It allows the robot to track fast randomly moving objects and grasp them (movies here). The applications seem endless!
I have seen many robot mpegs as of late, many courtesy of /., but these have to be some of the coolest I have ever come across. A must see."
Site is Slashdotted - and no comments! (Score:2, Informative)
A human being recognizes external environment by using many kinds of sensory information. By integrating these information and making up lack of information for each other, a more reliable and multilateral recognition can be achieved. The purpose of Sensor Fusion Project is to realize new sensing architecture by integrating multi-sensor information and to develop hierarchical and decentralized architecture for recognizing human beings further. As a result, more reliable and multilateral information can be extracted, which can realize high level recognition mechanism.
Note that the site is mostly pictures, which explained why it went down so quickly. There's almost no decent text at all
Re:How fast (Score:2, Informative)
I would describe the speed as on the order of 1/3 the speed of a dog being teased with a tennis ball.
And the sequence looked about the same; the robot hand follows the ball back and forth just like a dog a then lunges out to grab it when it sees its opportunity.
Re:Another VLSI breakthrough (Score:5, Informative)
Erm VLSI just means putting lots of stuff on one chip (Very Large Scale Integration). Do you mean "CMOS instead of CCD"?
(more detailed explanation) [vvl.co.uk]
The increased framerates possible using this technology, rather than CCD, probably help when doing fast motion detection as the robot in the article is doing.
Looks familiar... (Score:2, Informative)
http://boingboing.net/2002_10_01_archive.html#855
see also
http://www.enorgis.com/arc20021013.htm#BlogID1043 [enorgis.com]
http://radio.weblogs.com/0103443/2002/10/10.html [weblogs.com]
But it's still quite amazing - that's why it stuck in my mind I s'pose
Applications? (Score:3, Informative)
sluggy glove ref 0 [sluggy.com]
sluggy glove ref 1 [sluggy.com]
mirror (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Site is Slashdotted - and no comments! (Score:2, Informative)
Not a biggy, just wondering if there was a reason that wasn't immediately obvious. (maybe that is the exact url that google gives out, which would be silly of them).
Re:Is it real? (Score:5, Informative)
The "eye" is really a high-speed sensor for a system of computers. The computers make calculations based on the fixed location of the camera and the variable, but known location of the robotic hand to determine the location in 3D space of the target. Then the target is stationary past a certain threshold time, the hand reaches out to grab it.
The computer array constantly updates the position of the arm and hand to try and match the location of the target, and that's where you get the illusion of human movement.
The human-like hand on the end of this arm is probably for the psychological benefit of investors, who would probably shit their pants at the sight of a high speed robotic claw grasping things dangled in front of it.
Nice Niven reference... (Score:2, Informative)
Mirror up an ready to go. (Score:3, Informative)
I tar'd all the mpegs into one file for easier downloading. Enjoy
Re:Nice Niven reference... (Score:3, Informative)
When evaluating a decision, the Moties say, "on one hand, on the other hand, and on the gripping hand," giving them three options where a 2-handed human has two.
Obligatory Amazon Link [amazon.com]
Good book, but buy it from a used bookstore if you can.
Mirror: (Score:1, Informative)
Re:From the videos (Score:2, Informative)
The arm's we make are really quite amazing. Extremely fast, accurate, and articulate. They have a 4-degree of freedom (dof) arm. We also make a 7-dof arm that is absolutely mesmerizing to watch. (Steel aircraft cables are used to drive it).