PersonalRobotsGroup
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Kinect sensor bolted to an iRobot Create, starts looking for trouble
While there have already been a lot of great proof-of-concepts for the Kinect, what we're really excited for are the actual applications that will come from it. On the top of our list? Robots. The Personal Robots Group at MIT has put a battery-powered Kinect sensor on top of the iRobot Create platform, and is beaming the camera and depth sensor data to a remote computer for processing into a 3D map -- which in turn can be used for navigation by the bot. They're also using the data for human recognition, which allows for controlling the bot using natural gestures. Looking to do something similar with your own robot? Well, the ROS folks have a Kinect driver in the works that will presumably allow you to feed all that great Kinect data into ROS's already impressive libraries for machine vision. Tie in the Kinect's multi-array microphones, accelerometer, and tilt motor and you've got a highly aware, semi-anthropomorphic "three-eyed" robot just waiting to happen. We hope it will be friends with us. Video of the ROS experimentation is after the break.
MIT's Affective Intelligent Driving Agent is KITT and Clippy's lovechild (video)
If we've said it once, we've said it a thousand times, stop trying to make robots into "friendly companions!" MIT must have some hubris stuck in its ears, as its labs are back at it with what looks like Clippy gone 3D, with an extra dash of Knight Rider-inspired personality. What we're talking about here is a dashboard-mounted AI system that collects environmental data, such as local events, traffic and gas stations, and combines it with a careful analysis of your driving habits and style to make helpful suggestions and note points of interest. By careful analysis we mean it snoops on your every move, and by helpful suggestions we mean it probably nags you to death (its own death). Then again, the thing's been designed to communicate with those big Audi eyes, making even our hardened hearts warm just a little. Video after the break. %Gallery-76874%
