Boston Engineering has created FlexStack.
The FlexStack product is a 2.5 inch, rugged platform that takes advantage of the flexibility of LabVIEW Embedded with the power of the Analog Devices Blackfin Processor.
Additional Resources:
Archive Page 3 of 7
Out of the many submissions to the NIWeek 2008 demo contest, this year we have yet another console game meets LabVIEW. Texas A&M students: Dave Buckner, Mitchell Jefferis, Vinny LaPenna, and Michael Voth are working on Slashbot.
From their blog:
To put it simply, we are designing a robot that is capable of autonomously playing a video game, the wildly popular Guitar Hero series. In the game a player attempts to simulate playing songs as color-coded buttons corresponding to notes scroll on the screen. A sensing and computation system will analyze the NTSC video signal as it is output from a PlayStation2 gaming system. The buttons a player is asked to press will be detected and an appropriate control signal will be sent to the robot. The robot will consist of six solenoid actuators, one for each colored button and one for the “strum” bar.
Resources mentioned:
Someone at NI just put up a slew of funny LabVIEW related videos on Youtube. I assume these are interns. Check them out below.
PS: Can you spot the Dr. T cameo?
Anybots just released a new video of the next version of Dexter. Dexter is a biped teleoperated robot created by the Mountain View, CA based company.
Dexter’s walking is performed autonomously and is a demonstration of the type of hybrid robot that Anybots is working on. It will mainly be teleoperated but certain tasks will be automated such as walking.
Here’s a VI Shots video of the Anybots team during last years Robodevelopment conference:
Addition resources:
I was the first to mentioned in a previous post about the great NXT website called nxtprograms.com. One distinct feature of the site is the crystal clear photos of the robots. Well, you too can take great photos of your own creations. The creator of the site has put up some tutorials on how to take photos just like the ones on the site.
Website: How to Take Good Photos of LEGOs
NXT-G Online is software that allows you to program a virtual Lego Mindstorms NXT. Are you a school that doesn’t have enough cash for an NXT hardware set. No fear, this virtual software actually lets you program in NXT-G and download to a virtual NXT brain. Then you can execute the code and see it in virtual action.
To help better understand what is going on in the video, here is the sequence of chronologically events:
- A challenge was selected - a video that came up introduced the challenge.
- The simulated NXT-G programming environment was opened
- Wrote some code (4 motor blocks were dragged onto the palette, and each was set at a different power level).
- Downloaded the NXT-G program to the virtual NXT robot, which automatically opened the virtual environment.
- The robot was moved to where we wanted it to start.
- The virtual NXT brick was opened and we ran the program that was just created. The robot moved accordingly.
Note that the release version of NXT-G Online also has the ability select different sensors and motors for the virtual robot after which you can go back and change your code to make use of your modifications.
VI Shots talked with Maria Bualat from the NASA Ames Research Intelligent Robotics Group. Gigapan.org is a website where people can upload super high resolution panoramic photos. These photos were taken by a prototype motorized automated pan and tilt camera mount that figures out the exact positions of all the multiple snapshots required to make an awesome high resolution panorama. Gigapan (gigapixel panorama) was developed by Carnegie Mellon University in collaboration with NASA Ames Intelligent Robotics Group, with support from Google. The price for this technology seems within reach of the consumer market at $279.
At the end of the video, Maria talks a little about here background and the K10 robotics platform which NASA used in the Canadian Arctic recently. The robots, K10 Black and K10 Red, carried 3-D laser scanners and ground-penetrating radar. The two NASA robots surveyed a rocky, isolated polar desert within a crater in the Arctic Circle. The study helped scientists learn how robots could evaluate potential outposts on the moon or Mars.
Resources mentioned in video:
- Intelligent Robotics group
- NASA Robots Practice Moon Survey in the Arctic Circle (Haughton Crater Site Survey Field Test)
- Gigapan Website
- Gigapan Hardware
- Quicktime Version of Video
Additional Video:
In this VI Shots video taken at Robodevelopment 2007, we talk with Ariel Cohen the founder and chairman of Galileo Mobility Instruments. Their company has developed a unique wheel that can transform into a rugged track quickly and easily.
Galileo is the innovator of a unique breakthrough technology, The Galileo Wheel which combines wheel and track in a single component. The simple mechanism enables switching back and forth between the two modes within seconds. The technology enables the device to use wheels whenever possible, and tracks whenever needed.
They are currently looking for partners to adapt their invention to the consumer robotics market after successfully landing a contract with an Israeli defense contractor.
Resources in this Video:
Additional video:
In this VI Shots video taken at Robodevelopment 2007, we talk with Paul Roberts, a developer with Microsoft Robotics Studio. Yes, it’s similar to LabVIEW and it can be used as a general purpose language.
Resources mentioned:
Braintech demonstrates Volts-IQ to VI Shots.
Braintech’s VOLTS-IQ Visual Intelligence Software Suite provides feature recognition, object localization and robot guidance in the form of Microsoft Robotics Studio (MSRS) services.
VOLTS-IQ uniquely combines Braintech’s proven robot vision expertise with Microsoft’s powerful MSRS service-based architecture. Using VOLTS-IQ, researchers, commercial product developers and hobbyists can “vision-enable” their robotic projects and products with unprecedented ease and speed, leap frogging the traditional barriers involved with vision development and bringing their ideas to life faster than ever.
Resources mentioned in this video:
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