Peter Perez's Fab Academy Portfolio

Final Project Log

The Big IDEA

A little interactive robot.

The initial idea for this project was a desktop companion robot, one to sit around the desk and keep you entertained/assist on difficult days. As I work on this project I think I will switch this design to one that is along the lines of a tamogatchi to start. These have interactivity, a set of images that render on a simple pixel screen, and some rudimentary AI probably random number generated. I want it to maintain its cute demeanor. But I do want it to be supremely customizable for anyone that interacts with the robot.

Sketchbook breakdown of new idea
Sketch Book images of idea

Final Project Concept: Desktop Companion Robot

When I was told that I would be able to build anything in this project, I knew exactly what I wanted to do. For a while I had been exploring the idea of making an astromech droid for the lab. However, making a full sized 4 foot tall droid could be a bit of a daunting task. That is where my ideas led to companion robots.

There has been some exploration into the idea of companion robots to assist people with loneliness as well as household tasks. And this also throws me back to childhood when companies would release little robotic dogs. This robot will be a similar device, but let us call him a desktop robot. He will sit and move around your desk and interact with you and anyone around you. The goal of this is not to truly create a companion, but to possible create an educational platform that has the psychological effect of a tamogatchi, but lives fully in the physical realm.

The Inspiration

For a while my instagram feed has been filled with ads for different companion robots. The most common ones being VECTOR and COZMO from Digital Dream Labs

Now the problem is, I believe paying $400 for one of these devices is not a reasonable cost. This may be a commodity, but leveraged well the unit can be a more affordable companion and pet assistant.

The Transition to a Modular Design

In week 2 we were asked to design the final project that we are working on to CAD. You can see more of the process of me doing this here but I ended up switching from a hidden box design to more of a modular slotted design.

Part of the reasoning behind this was to create not just a companion, but one that can be modified to your needs with different components. This would be a great addition I think but complicated my general design due to making all sorts of pieces fit into the unified model. Think of LittleBits but for a robot.

The Transition to the Hex Design

In week 6 we were asked to code the QUENTORRES board and as part of this I learned how to control DAP-R's Bowtie unit.

But this small project led me to switch the idea for my design to something more static. Something along the lines of the "Astromech Droids" in Star Wars.

A design like this would let me stack up the mechanisms inside of the robot and have a more desktop design with an aesthetically pleasing package. Below is a sketch of the proposed design and next I will have to re-do my Fusion project to create this new model.

Making the Eyes Work!

I wanted to give my robot emotion so on the Output Devices week I worked on giving him working eyes using a small screen. I think it came out excellent!

Letting DAP-R Detect a Person

This week I worked on having DAP-r see using a Mu Vision Sensor. I got this system to work but unfortunately it needed a Arduino microcontroller and I do not want to use that so I am back to the drawing board soon.

The Planning Cycle

Now that all the different parts are working, things need to be integrated so breaking things down into components is the best way of doing this. I will be using this following Gantt chart to guide my work:

The Gantt

Sketch Book images of idea