Don't be fooled by the fancy monocle: this servo-powered serpent is as American as Apple Computers. So American, in fact, that his creators at Carnegie Mellon decided to christen him Uncle Sam. Boasting more points of articulation than a GI Joe, Sam's hobbies include crawlin' ...more
With Facebook and Twitter dominating the world, playing chess opposite a real, touchable person is no longer necessary. With the ChessBot, you can now play on a real chessboard remotely - the next best thing to in-person play. From Norris Labs: "Although ChessBot by itself d ...more
Unfortunately there's no information in English on this Japanese craftsman's incredible mechanical wooden sculptures. His YouTube profile lists his occupation as pharmacist (apparently he's a pharmacist with some crazy woodworking skills). These little mechanical workhorses a ...more
The Stretta Procedure created this amazingly helpful mini dolly.
If you or someone you know has younger kids and you're looking for an augmented reality toy, Pai Technology has just the educational option for you. For $199, the toy maker offers Augie, a spherical robot that uses augmented reality to teach children the basics of programming ...more
Replicate Bender, the robot from Futurama, as your emblem when you play Call of Duty: Black Ops on multiplayer. This is an easy tutorial that will let you show your appreciation for cartoon robots while you lay waste to the enemy team.
Will the bot band be to 2017 what the boy band was to 1997? You be the judge! In the videos below, two such groups offer electro-mechanical renditions of the B-52s' "Rock Lobster" and Queen's "Bohemian Rhapsody." Creator James Cochrane writes, "What do you get when you combine ...more
If you want your Lego Mindstorms NXT robot to function as accurately as possible youneed to understand how to get data from the viewing sensors via the NXT brick. Learn how to use the NXT brick and the NXT programming environment to view and change light, sound, or touch senso ...more
I think I hate this game. I don't really see how you can play more than 15 minutes of Tap Mania without smashing your head into a wall. You do nothing but tap. Tap, tap, tap. At least they got the name right. My editor asked me "would you enjoy this game more if you followed ...more
A Simple Vibrobot. Build a simple vibrating robot. A hobby robot, well almost.
Steampunk music is an oft-debated genre, full of bands playing all sorts of different sounds. While this can make it difficult to generalize about the genre as a whole, it means that the average person is bound to like at least some Steampunk bands. That's why it's a great ide ...more
Wow, this robot has incredible movement. "A-Pod is an ant inspired hexapod robot with a 2 DOF abdomen (tail), a 3 DOF head with large mandibles. 6 legs with 3 DOF each. Total 25 servos. This video demonstrates body movement and mandible control... The robot are remotely contr ...more
The tradition of using cutting edge technology to prepare for missions in space, in this case, augmented reality, continues with a new team of international astronauts slated to board the International Space Station (ISS) later this year. On Tuesday, European Space Agency ast ...more
New documents reveal that electric car company Tesla has filed a surprising new patent that has nothing to do with batteries or autonomous driving and everything to do with augmented reality. Last week, the company's US Patent and Trademark Office patent application, titled " ...more
This NXT Mindstorm LEGO robot can actually walk on a treadmill. Quite an amazing feet. Nicknamed "Pinocchio" the Department of Biomechanics at the FSU Jena created it.
I'm starting to wonder if the people at Boston Dynamics have ever watched a Terminator movie. Not just because the robotics company with the oxymoronic name develops machines that are able to move around environments with animal- and human-like agility, but because the people ...more
K'NEX is the world's most famous constructive toy, which means you can build just about anything. You can take the K'NEX plastic pieces and build all kinds of contraptions, everything from boats to airplanes to robots to weapons. Watch this two-part video tutorial to see how ...more
Now that its first developer conference is in the rearview mirror, Magic Leap continues to nurture its content development community, this time with an assist from strategic investor and retail partner AT&T. After accepting submissions through Oct. 26, Magic Leap held its fir ...more
In this video, we learn how to draw a robot. Start off by drawing the outline of the robot, then draw in the details of the robot's exterior. Make sure to use squares to make it appear like the robot is a bunch of metal pieces put together. After this, you will fill in the rob ...more
Remember Big Dog? Or Big Dog's counterpart, Little Dog? Well, Boston Dynamics has added a new member to their creepily-moving-calvary. Boston Dynamics mission statement: "PETMAN is an anthropomorphic robot for testing chemical protection clothing used by the US Army. Unlike ...more
It finally happened! In a world of "go big or go home," Magic Leap has finally done something other than tease us with vague promises and rendered video concepts. Although, other than actually showing us what the developer's kit will look like, it seems little more than a slig ...more
Ask anyone that works on the development of driverless vehicle technology and there is a very good chance that AutonomouStuff will have supplied something to their project. Ottomatika, Cruise Automation, and Otto are all companies that specialize in self-driving technology, a ...more
A controversial video from Magic Leap's past has once again surfaced, but this time it comes with a lot more credibility and a good bit of excitement around the Magic Leap One headset. New Zealand's Weta Workshop has revealed that it will release the game "Dr. Grordbort's: In ...more
In the wealthy oil man's world of Arabian camel racing, the tradition of using child jockeys has been replaced with the use of small robo-jockeys in recent years. But after finally ridding the game of the mistreatment of children, the sport is now under scrutiny again. The Dub ...more
Never being contacted for a job you're interested in interviewing for is a terrible feeling. It might make you feel inadequate as if your qualifications aren't up to par, but the problem might be that your resume isn't even getting read in the first place. Most recruiters and ...more
Robots have a long-standing obsession with tandem bikes. The first song ever sung by a computer? "Daisy Bell." If you don't recognize the title, you might nevertheless recognize the song's famous refrain: "But you'd look sweet/Upon the seat/Of a bicyle built for two." That was ...more
A video tutorial on how to use the wiimote to control a Lego NXT robot. Link to download GlovePie: http://carl.kenner.googlepages. com/glovepie_download Script for Glovepie wiimote.Leds = 9 Key.F1 = Wiimote1.Left Key.F2 = Wiimote1.Right Key.F3 = Wiimote1.Up Key.F4 = Wiimote1. ...more
For those who thought the action in Pokémon Go was a bit too pedestrian, Father.io wants to recruit you for a multi-player, first-person shooter that unfolds on the streets of your own city. Through a mobile app, available now on the App Store and Google Play, and a pocket-si ...more
With CES in full swing, it seemed like Magic Leap would have little to announce at the major tech event, but it turns out that one of its partners has weighed in with a rather substantial update regarding the company. On Wednesday, AT&T announced that it would be expanding it ...more
K'NEX is the world's most famous constructive toy, which means you can build just about anything. You can take the K'NEX plastic pieces and build all kinds of contraptions, everything from boats to airplanes to robots to weapons. Watch this video tutorial to see how to build ...more
Usually, when the public gets to see and hear Microsoft's Alex Kipman expound on the future of immersive computing, it's because the company has a new product to show off. But on Tuesday, April 24, Kipman was in the spotlight for an entirely different reason: an award nominati ...more
Don't worry, the robot apocalypse is not upon us...yet. Wired reports it may be closer than you think: "The 'Humanoids with auditory and visual abilities in populated spaces' (HUMAVIPS) project has the ambitious goal of making humanoid bots just that bit more human by buildin ...more
Neon explosions, flying robots, laser swords, what's not to like about Lost Planet: Extreme Condition? Well, maybe the final boss. This video shows how to take him down without breaking a sweat.
K'NEX is the world's most famous constructive toy, which means you can build just about anything. You can take the K'NEX plastic pieces and build all kinds of contraptions, everything from boats to airplanes to robots to weapons. Watch this two-part video tutorial to see how ...more
Many new parents will tell you how hard it is to name a baby. Some have stories of how they knew what the name of their child would be from before conception, only to change their mind when they were born. Sometimes new babies can go weeks without a name since there is an endl ...more
K'NEX is the world's most famous constructive toy, which means you can build just about anything. You can take the K'NEX plastic pieces and build all kinds of contraptions, everything from boats to airplanes to robots to weapons. Watch this video tutorial to see how to build ...more
Look no further than Flint, Michigan, to discover the serious consequences of contaminated drinking water. Around the world, water polluted by pathogens and toxins sickens people or cuts them off from safe drinking water. Looking for a solution, researchers created tiny, swimm ...more
Researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology recently set about creating what might aptly be described as a baby Decepticon — a small, semi-autonomous robot vehicle that purposely engages in deceptive behavior to achieve its ends (in this case, winning a game of hide and ...more
Developers across the U.S. and Canada have started getting their augmented reality headset packages from Microsoft, and so far, everyone's raving about one gaming experience that shatters all doubts of just what the HoloLens can do... RoboRaid. Video: . In the video from Fun W ...more
This week, the beginning of an epic legal battle was set to begin between augmented reality players Magic Leap and Nreal, the small China-based startup accused by the former of stealing trade secrets. However, a new wrinkle has emerged in the legal skirmish that could change ...more
Office workers beware, or a snarky robot may unleash a barrage of ping pong balls upon you. A somewhat sinister individual from the CKBot group at UPenn’s Modlab concocted the prank. According to Bot Junkie, it operates as follows: "A remote control raises a cutout section of ...more
It's odd to see grown humans attempting to bounce off walls doing parkour. It's another thing altogether to see a robot doing it. University of California Berkeley's Biomimetic Millisystems Lab has created the world's most vertically agile robot—capable of jumping to unimagin ...more
Have you ever wanted to control a swarm of robots? Well, now you can! Robotics researchers at New York University (NYU) have created an app which controls 'bots from your smartphone, using augmented reality. This AR app would certainly come in handy when you want to make a cof ...more
Can a robot be dumber than a toaster? For the answer, look no further than Bacarobo—a yearly contest that showcases and celebrates and the world's dumbest, most adorable robots. Each year, ten robots vie for first prize. Each year, only one bot wins. Who took the title of Top ...more
CMU’s Biorobotics Laboratory modular snake robot slithers in all sorts of different ways. Check out the three videos in the gallery below. Project statement: "Snake robots can use their many internal degrees of freedom to thread through tightly packed volumes accessing locat ...more
So you've made a somersaulting robot, one that delivers your beer, and even a robot you can ride, but you want to try out something really different. Why not add a steam engine? Inspired by the Steam Walker by Crabfu Steamworks, Professeur Shadoko of French DIY blog Brico Bid ...more
At any moment, you can open up Meerkat and start live-streaming a video from your smartphone, available for anyone to watch. Thanks to its popularity at SXSW and the backing of several big Hollywood players, the app just announced that it's receiving $14 million in funding. A ...more
As it turns out, Apple did get AR hardware into its retail stores for the 2017 holiday shopping season, but it's not the headset we've been hearing rumors about for years; it's the MekaMon battle-bot. Apple will be the exclusive retailer for the AR robot, which can be purchas ...more
What could be a cooler cake for a little boy's birthday than a robot? This awesome cake comes straight from Betty Crocker's kitchen and will delight young and old with its funky robotic charm. Follow along with this video and start decorating your own little guy.
The first marriage to be officiated by a robot took place in Japan this past Sunday. A humanoid robot named I-Fairy stood in as witness at the ceremony between Tomohiro Shibata and Satoko Inoue of Tokyo. Reuters reports: "The bride, Inoue, works for the company that makes th ...more
While VR promises to take gamers to another world, AR has the potential to bring the game elements into your own neighborhood or home. Just in time for Halloween, ARZombi places your living room into the epicenter of a zombie outbreak, with your ARKit-compatible iPhone or iPa ...more
This robot hasn't levitated any humans yet (especially not pictured Days of Our Lives star Deidre Hall), but it looks like the sky may be the limit with the Robo-Air Jet System. Developed by Aaron Becker and Robert Sandheinrich at the University of Illinois, Urbana, the Robo- ...more
Real life transformer, OmniZero, can climb a ladder, perform somersaults, jump rope, crack eggs, battle other robots, and best of all, carry a person. Witness all of these actions of the various OmniZero prototypes in the video gallery below.
This kid looks less than pleased (skip to 2:37). The goal of Swarm-bots is to show how many small robots can work together to achieve a larger task (such as dragging a little girl's body across the floor): "The goal of this project is the study of a novel design approach to ...more
The hype train that left the station years ago has reached its first stop, and now we finally have access to the Magic Leap One, the device many have claimed would revolutionize the augmented reality space at launch. But is that really true? On Wednesday morning, as Next Real ...more
Lego Mindstorms NXT robots are capable of displaying images, text and/or feedback on their screens. To get them to do this you have to learn how to program display blocks in the NXT programming environment. Program display blocks in the Lego Mindstorms system. Click through to ...more
Machinarium is a fun little indie game where you play a robot in a point and click puzzle adventure. This tutorial is a walkthrough for part four of the game, where your robot ventures from the castle into the city of the robots.
What feature would we most like to see in the robots of tomorrow? Why, the ability to interact with human beings without crushing them to death, of course. Happily, thanks to a new pressure-sensitive synthetic skin technology, the dream is within reach: "Today’s advanced robo ...more
Wu Yulu's life story belongs in a Disney movie. The 46-year-old Chinese farmer has built 26 robots over the past 30 years, with no education beyond high school. He says he loves his robots more dearly than his own sons and rides around his village in a robot powered rickshaw. ...more
This project has been posted on Vimeo for the past two years, and somehow has just entered my radar now. Get this: A robot is manned by a Madagascan hissing cockroach. Each movement the roach makes (perched atop a trackball type ping-pong ball) controls the movement of the rob ...more