Meet Boxie. He’s a robot videographer with levels of interaction we haven’t seen outside an episode of Dora the Explorer. The project was conceived by [Alex] as his MIT thesis project to see if robots can use humans to make themselves more useful. All we know is Boxie is freaking adorable, as evidenced by this video.

The idea behind Boxie was inspired by Afghan Explorer to capture video in an attempt to tell a story. In the videos (after the break), Boxie wanders around the halls of MIT searching for people to help him (“can you carry me up the stairs?”) and tell stories (“what do you do here?”). It’s an experiment in autonomous documentary directorial skill that was edited down into a video that made sense.

[Alex] designed Boxie to be the cutest thing we’ve ever seen so he could elicit a response from the subjects of the documentary. We’re going to say the voice helped, but [Alex] also found the cardboard robot factor also played into the success. Boxie was originally planned to have a plastic skin, but [Alex]‘s friends thought it looked really creepy. They suggested that [Alex] go back to the prototype cardboard body. All we know is there’s a robot cuter than a Keepon, finally.

Everyone’s getting on board with the 555 timer projects. But [Tom] didn’t just come up with one project, he shared a slew of ideas related to analog robotics. They’re center around servo motor control. You can see in the video after the break he has a pleasing way of sharing a lot of details while also making an easy to view demonstration video. He’ll put up a schematic for about one second and then move on, saving those that don’t care about the details by not droning on.

The first schematic that flashes by is the main circuit for controlling the servo motor. The rest of the concepts build from this circuit, using light, sound, flex, and other sensors as inputs. For instance, the setup above is using a light sensor. When the ball blocks the light the servo moves that vertical rod hitting it out of the way. When it swings back the process repeats. It’s striking how lifelike the reactions are, reminding us of insect movements. But this is really just the tip of the iceberg as he’s got a lot of future video ideas that we can’t wait to see.

[Thanks Jeri]

[Johnny Chung Lee], having recently moved from Seattle to Mountain View, wanted a way to keep in touch with his fiancé who would not be relocating for several more months. While most of us would likely consider purchasing a pair of web cams to keep in touch, he decided to do things his own way.  Using an iRobot Create and a netbook, both about $250 apiece, he constructed a remote-controlled video chat robot that he can steer around his former abode from 1,000 miles away. While $500 might seem expensive at first, [Johnny] reminds us that commercial versions likely run into the thousands of dollars.

The whole setup is controlled using custom software to manage the movement of the robot, which can be used in conjunction with freely available videoconferencing applications, such as Skype. He also modified the iRobot’s charging station to charge both the robot and the netbook simultaneously – a process he explains, but precedes with several disclaimers.  Like some of his previous projects we have covered, he has made the C# source used in this project available for download on his site, along with documentation for both the control software and dock modifications.

Check out video of the robot in action after the jump.

Anyone who is familiar with animatronics or even most robotics knows that almost every build is a hack if you don’t plan on reproducing it.  This gallery is to show off the work of [John Nolan]. However, instead of just posting the final product, he has posted several galleries that show, in detail, the internal structures. Curious how to rig a jaw or an eyebrow?  Wanna see the internals of an animatronic baby? How about building giant monster hands that are rugged and have full digit control? It’s all in the gallery.

If you give a mouse a cookie, he will ask for a glass of milk. If you give a team of geeks a box full of parts ranging from aluminum to plywood to motors to RF interfaces, they will build a robot. Introducing Best Robotics, a volunteer group that gives schools a box of hardware and 6 weeks to build a robot that will compete against other schools for the title of champion.

This past Saturday the17th, the OKBest regional competition was held and I, HaD writer [Jakob], was lucky enough to be invited personally to not only watch – but compete. Check out our full breakdown after the jump.

First an explanation of the competition. Each year the ‘goal’ changes but always includes several of the same concepts. Remote controlled robots must pick up different items for points, assemble something for multipliers, and signal a tie breaker. This year the robot’s task was to scavenge and collect tennis balls, racket balls, soup cans, beach balls, and 6inch PVC pipe sections – easy right?

Well not when those tennis balls are catalysts, racket balls are water, soup cans are energy, beach balls are CO2, and the PVC represents benzene. See where we’re going, if not think chemistry. It gets harder when you learn almost none of those game pieces are in play unless you send an IR signal to the game field. We haven’t even gotten to the 2 foot size restriction in all 3 dimensions and the finite parts list. Those who want to read more about the game and rules this year can find it here.

So how did I get the chance to compete? Well, being team captain really helps. Meet team ENHS. The past two years we’ve come nearly in last place and this this was our third, and potentially final time to partake within Best; it was time to stop being the underdogs.

Our robot design included an undercarriage ‘stomach’ and frontal ‘mouth’ that could be raised and lowered to capture the tennis balls, racket balls, and soup cans. We decided against attaining CO2 and benzene after finding we could achieve a max score of about 21 million points without them. The control system, programming, and IR commands were all handled by yours truly – while the rest of the team did most of the construction – and painting.

The great thing about Best is that if you don’t have an engineering degree, or even know what a motor does. There are awards that can actually get you to first place by best documentation, most enthusiasm, best T-shirt design, most interesting interview, and several others. But it still exposes people to robots and their construction, hopefully to influence them towards a career in technology.

So how did we actually do? 5th place overall out of 12. Not to bad considering last year we got 18th out of 17 teams (we don’t know how we managed that either). Win or lose, the experience, knowledge, and fun we gained from the competition will last a lifetime. The competition however will not, as funding for Best has declined over the years and our region next year will not play host. Hats off to the best year of Best.

[Christian Ristow], a former Muppet creator, has created a much larger puppet that has caught the attention of Popular Mechanics. His Hand of Man is a 27 foot long remote control mechanical claw. Powered by a 90 hp diesel engine, the hydraulic system can be controlled by a glove worn by the operator. This started as a demonstration for a robotics fair, but has recently made appearances at Burning Man, Maker Faire, and had the Grand Champions seat of Popular Mechanic’s Backyard Geniuses Award. While not as practical as some robotic human augmentations, it can crush a car. [Christian] is even allowing anyone who is interested at these events to pick things up and crush them at their own whim.

Various promo videos after the jump.

Burning Man 2008:

Makers-Faire 2009:

Popular Science BG Award Video

[photo Popular Mechanics]

Dating back to September of 2007, this certainly isn’t new news, but its new to us. This is Little dog, the miniature version of the ever so creepy Big Dog. We aren’t sure if the lack of Big dogs signature jogging in place makes this little guy seem more lifelike or less.  Little dog was designed to be a research platform into study automated navigation of natural terrain. We wouldn’t mind having one of these around the office, though we would have to add some kind of a head or face to give it some character.

[via Bot Junkie]

If you feel the same way that we do about robotics, you probably wish that you had more experience with them when you were a kid. [Don] felt that way too, and he decided to do something about it. So [Don] and his partner started the Chicago based organization Bots 4 Tots, with the mission of introducing inner city kids to robotics. [Don] told us that his organization plans on starting the kids with snap together projects like OWI’s Jungle Robot. After a few snap together projects, they plan to introduce the kids to soldering and hope to eventually move on to a larger collaborative project that all the kids can work on. Of course, doing all of these things requires money. Thats where we, as the DIY community, come in. So feel free to hit up the Bots 4 Tots site and make a donation to support their worthwhile cause, we know we will.

If they wanted to, [Levin] and [Baltus] could possibly crank up the spook factor by adding facial recognition and programming it to remember how certain people interact with it, then tailor its behavior to wink at different rates or become more shy or bold, depending on the personality of the person watching it. Of course, that would require that someone goes back to it more than once…

[via Glass Tumbler]

One of the ones that caught our eye is the Shadow Robot Company’s The Shadow Hand we first posted in 2005. Despite its name, this robot was not designed for evil, but to be the best available robot modeled on the human hand. It is composed of a system of more than 40 air muscles, which are flexible devices made of a rubber tube surrounded by a flexible plastic mesh. The Air Muscles provide the pulling force needed to clench and unclench the hand.

An even more advanced robot is the anthropomorphic HOAP-3 (PDF file), which can walk, talk, and look good in one of those tall chef hats. What’s more, the robot can be taught to perform simple tasks; in the video, a team of researchers at the Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne in Switzerland taught the HOAP-3 to mix eggs in a mixing bowl by simple demonstrating once how it’s done.

A chef robot may be impressive, but robot clergymen simply blow our minds. That’s the best way to describe Tiro (site is in Korean), a robot that was used to officiate the wedding of one of its creators. Tiro is designed to be a general helper robot, and is capable of playing back audio, moving on its own, carrying objects in its arms, and displaying various facial expressions on its LED face. All these abilities make Tiro well-suited to complete basic social tasks, although we’re not sure whether they’re all ordained ministers or if that’s only true for the one pictured above.

Check out some more lovable and functional bots at the read link below, and see if your favorite robot made the list.

[via Shake Well Before Use]