This has got to be one of the creepiest music videos I have ever seen. I can easily see it brain-washing whole countries, preparing the way for our new metal masters. At the same time it’s hypnotically cool. Be warned, this is a real Earworm. Once you view and listen to this techno-creepiness, you won’t be able to get it out of your head.

The band consists of 3 humans up front and 3 robots in back. Not only do they have a robot guitarist, they also sport a robo-drummer. But the real star of the show would have to be the robot vocalist. Maywa Denki, (the artist) who has created an actual singing robot, thanks to a large mechanical bellows and a computer-controlled rubber vocal chord.

They are sure to be a hit, with lyrics like:

“The love we get used to, it always looks like an empty Panda.” or “Louise Brown: What are you looking at to dance?”. Then there’s my personal favorite, “Surprise hiccups, la cha cha cha”. There was also one about drinking white slime.

Good luck getting that little ditty out of your head now.

[Maywa Denki] VIA [Stateshirt]

Researchers at the University of Tokyo have been hard at work on something new, but they’re not the ones jumping for joy. They leave that up to their new two-legged robot creature, who can actually jump about 50-centimeters high and then land gracefully. It’s actually part of a larger ongoing project that they hope will create humanoids with cat-like reflexes that can assist the elderly when used as caregivers. While robot legs are nothing new, this pair doesn’t rely on electric motors, instead it has air-driven artificial muscles.

I can easily imagine these legs attached to some basketball playing robot torsos in the near future. Right now, it’s no Michael Jordan, but this innovation opens up a lot of possibilities for the robots of tomorrow.

Update: The bot now has a name. It is called Mowgli. Here is a video of it in action.

[Nikkei] VIA [Engadget]

Best-Selling Mystery writer Kyotaro Nishimura has his own museum. Now, thanks to Fujitsu, he has a robot to go with it. Jointly developed by Fujitsu Frontech and Fujitsu Laboratories, the robot will act as a visitors’ guide at the Museum beginning September 21. Enon will autonomously move to the entrance of the museum to greet guests, then guide visitors through the exhibits using its voice, gestures or its LCD screen. It will even play video greetings from Mr. Nishimura.

And if after all of this you still don’t think that Mr. Nishimura is important, you can take a quiz related to his exploits via Enon’s LCD chest. If you answer all of the questions correctly, you get…

(Drumroll please…)

A commemorative certificate from the Museum.

Joy.

[Frontech] VIA [Engadget]

At 1/4 cubic inch in volume and a weight of less than 1 ounce, these mini-robots being developed by Sandia National Labs may be some of the smallest autonomous untethered robots in existence. They’re powered by 3 watch batteries, and have tracked drive systems, an 8K ROM processor, a temperature sensor, and optionally a miniature camera, microphone, communication system, and chemical micro-sensor. The bodies of the robots are created through rapid-prototyping and are mostly constrained by the size of the batteries required to power them (meaning that they’ll shrink further with improvements in battery technology). With a top speed of only 20 inches per minute, each bot may not be able to get very far very fast, but they’re designed to be used in swarms to accomplish larger and more complex tasks. Video of the mini-bot driving over loose change after the jump. (Read more…)

Poor RoboSapien, he has to endure such humiliation. Look at those little red eyes, pleading with you, “for the love of Asimov get me out of this stupid Elmo suit!” And it’s not just the suit… No, ElmoSapien comes complete with an Elmo personality and 209 customized Elmo sound files:

The Elmo personality is free to download and use on your RoboSapien, but the costume was custom made from an Elmo hand puppet. If you’d like something slightly less, uh, Elmo-y, check out the VaderSapien personality, also free for download. All in all, I think RoboSapien would really prefer either a flamethrower or a coil gun. Or, both.

[ ElmoSapien ] VIA [ Coolest-Gadgets ]

Last week, I posted a video showing a robot getting blown up while trying to disable an IED in Iraq. Watching the video made me wonder about the relationship between soldiers and their robot friends and co-workers. This past May, the Washington Post had an article about this very thing, an excerpt of which I’ve included here:

Ted Bogosh recalls one day in Camp Victory, near Baghdad, when he was a Marine master sergeant running the robot repair shop.

That day, an explosive ordnance disposal technician walked through his door. The EODs, as they are known, are the people who — with their robots — are charged with disabling Iraq’s most virulent scourge, the roadside improvised explosive device. In this fellow’s hands was a small box. It contained the remains of his robot. He had named it Scooby-Doo.

Read the rest of this quite touching story after the jump. (Read more…)

Making the jump from military hardware to the police and civilian markets are these miniature UAVs called MicroDrones. Developed in Germany, they boast all kinds of brilliant features, ranging from GSM network communications to 3D controllability with what’s basically a Wiimote (more on that later). According to the Times (the UK Times), the bots have been or are going to be used by police departments to monitor rock concerts, football (soccer) crowds, and “antisocial behavior” in public parks. There’s also been interest from fire departments, environmental agencies, MI5, the Metropolitan police, and the Serious Organized Crime Agency (as opposed to the Joking Organized Crime Agency, I guess).

The MicroDrone is well suited to just about any mission you can dream up. It’s rugged, versatile, nearly silent, and can carry a 1kg payload for about 20 minutes (full specs here). Sure, that’s not the longest time, but you can always swap out batteries and send it right back up. The newest version of the bot is controlled through a GSM modem attached to an RC transmitter (the bot has its own SIM card installed). The remote just makes an ordinary phone call through a commercial GSM network to talk to the bot and send commands. Other features include automated GPS waypoint navigation (through what looks to be a Google Maps interface, no less), and a commercial digital camera mount. Each one of these little guys will set you back about $60,000 or you can rent one for 2 grand a month. More info and the video after the jump. (Read more…)

Aside from being part of the Botjunkie team, I am also an artist and part time collectibles/antiques dealer. In other words, I come across alot of cool vintage parts and for the last several years, I make robots with them.

Today, I’m going to show you how to build a simple Camera robot. A robot made from found objects that you may have laying around the house. I’ll give you some basic ideas on what you’ll need to build it, show you step by step how it can be done and at the end, I will show you some other vintage camera robots that I’ve made in the past to give you an idea of what other things can be done. You are only limited by your imagination. So, follow me after the jump for lots of pictures and a walkthrough.

(Read more…)

Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak has always been on the bleeding edge of what’s new and techy, all the way from Segway Polo to Kathy Griffin. So it’s great to hear that he’s looking to the personal robotics market to develop in much the same way as the personal computer market did, through easy programmability. Here’s an excerpt from an eWeek article about an event he spoke at this past weekend:

Apple Co-founder Steve Wozniak says one of the primary emerging technologies that is capturing his imagination these days is area of robotics and how artificial intelligence will be applied on those types of systems. Wozniak said he hopes that someday the robotics field will take a page from the personal computer era by creating robots that are easily programmable by users to perform specific tasks rather than solely focusing on creating system that are preprogrammed to perform specific functions. “People want things that are useful as opposed to things that do a lot of little things that we call artificial intelligence,” said Wozniak.

First Bill Gates, now Woz? Hmm, maybe we’re actually on to something here…

[ eWeek ] VIA [ Robots.net ]

UAV Airborne LAN

Back in June we covered LANdroids over at OhGizmo; little expendable bots that wander around to create and optimize an insta-WiFi network. In an obvious (and awesome) extension of the concept, Danger Room is reporting that hand-held UAVs are being outfitted as airborne ethernet hubs. The primary use for the ad-hoc network will be controlling other UAVs that are out of easy transmission distance, with massive multiplayer Counterstrike games using up the rest of the bandwidth. The Army has so far ordered some 6,000 of AeroVironment’s Raven B UAVs, which unfortunately don’t seem to be available to fly circuits over my backyard to boost my weak router.

RoboCopters and ScanEagle after the jump. (Read more…)