Artist Carl Pisaturo creates some amazing kinetic sculptures. His robotic creation, Slave Zero (video above), is an amazing half-human scale robotic creation with life-like motions which are controlled via an intricate web of cables. Slave Zero uses 21 servos to drive 41 joints and achieves incredibly fluid motion.

[Via Robot Snob]

The RoboBuilder robotics kits from a Korean company of the same name (or is it IRobou?) is now available for purchase from RobotShop. The kits, which are similar to the Bioloid robotics kits from Robotis, employ modular components, like motors and sensors, to allow builders to quickly create a wide variety of robotic creations. RoboBuilder touts features such as metal ball bearings, PID motor control for precise motion, and reverse/over voltage protection. The kits also come with distance and sound sensors.

The basic RoboBuilder kit starts at $349 and goes all the way up to $3,000 for the Expert kit. Have any of our readers played with the kits yet? Let us know how they are by leaving a comment.

You can check out a video of the RoboBuilder humanoid model after the break.

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We received a note from Sven Behnke of team NimbRo. He pointed us to a video the team had uploaded of the final RoboCup match between NimbRo and Team Osaka. We also took some video of the event, but unfortuatenly it didn’t turn out well. Sven wrote:


Here’s is the video of the match:



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A couple of notable interviews hit the web today.

The first is Astrobiology Magazine’s interview with Alex Ellery. Ellery heads the Surrey Space Centre’s Robotics group and is taking part in the European Space Agency’s ExoMars project.

The second comes from BusinessWeek, who interviews Tatsuya Matsui on the future of humanoid robotics. Matsui’s the fellow who made the robo-mannequin Palette.

Note: Lest ye be confused, this is actually a few years old. FYI.

I stumbled upon this via Del.icio.us. It’s a beautifully rendered short film with this premise:

 "What if we could build a system to help police in developing nations?"

The solution, presented in breathtaking realism, is the "Tetra Vaal Robot". You really will just have to see it to understand. It’s about a 16mb download, but definitely worth it. The folks at Analogik, who reviewed the video, say:

"OK, now we have really reached the point where it is impossible to tell the difference between the computer-generated material and the real footage. Talented people at The Embassy Visual Effects Inc. have created a magnificent piece directed by Neill Blomkamp."

 They also say, "After you see it once, replay the video and pay attention to some of the poses that the robot makes. Let us, for example, take a look at the robot holding the machine gun upright in a rather patronising and authoritative manner while patrolling the streets of Johannesburg."

Go check out the video now.

Oh man, I want one of these! Unveiled on September 18th at, "An exhibition of major achievements of the national 10th Five-Year program," The "Huitong" robot, "possesses functions including sense of sight, audio dialogue, sense of force and sense of balance. This humanoid robot with independent intellectual property realizes complicated human actions, such as Taijiquan (or shadowboxing) and saberplay."

Yeh buddy, "Saberplay." I can just picture an army of hundreds of these with swords coming after me. Apparently, the Chinese don’t want to be outdone by the Koreans and Japanese.


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