Tablet Face

Question

Many robots are built with installed tablets. Often the tablet is in a head. I was wondering if anyone has seen or could build a face that could be displayed on the screen. I have seen this idea around.

It consists of the basic face features eye brows, eyes and a mouth only. These features are able to move to show expression. Has anyone seen this feature or messed with one? Is it possible to build?

Ron R

Edit: The idea is like ROMO. I want only the face which could be run by an EZB.

DJ possible?

Proteus · Answer

Hey Andy, i have tought of the exact same thing. I think it would be possible and not hard to add to the interface builder (4 DJ) . We could have a face builder and it could react to variables coming from ARC ( $sad_face, $happy_face, the soundboard, etc).

Andy Roid · Answer

That is what I am talking about. ! I know there are some current robot projects that would have a need. It would also be a fun addition for a Roli or Adventurebot. Thanks, Ron R

Dunning-Kruger · Answer

I smell a plugin....

Proteus · Answer

We need to convince DJ to help!

Andy Roid · Answer

Everyone say Please...

Nomad 6R · Answer

PLEASE does rafiki have such a face frm david cohran.

Andy Roid · Answer

Maybe some day.. Ron

Doombot · Answer

I've toyed with the idea, but I am not capable of making anything "cute". It kinda sucks that I can't.

But here's the idea...use a flash animation program like Swish or something like that, they're very easy to use and make animations...then export them as videos, like .avi or .mov, then use the ControlCommand() script to bring up the expression/ animation you made on video player, full screen. That should be doable right?

CochranRobotics · Answer

Rafiki does have multiple faces. It will be one of its plugins. They aren't animated but switch based on the condition. The jpg images can be replaced with other faces if someone wants to do this.

DJ Sures · Answer

Use the Video Player, that is what it was created for. There is an example in the examples folder... 1) Open ARC 2) select OPEN from file menu 3) Navigate to Examples -> EZ-Script Examples 4) Load Video Player project 5) Run the script Also - if you decide to make a plugin, check the Display Popup plugin source code. From that, it would be very easy to modify and display a stretched jpeg/png image. It can be specified via ControlCommand() easily

DJ Sures · Answer

I can't seem to find it - but there was a robot in the forum that this was created for a few years ago. The robot had facial expressions that were video files...

Proteus · Answer

To do that you need your robot to have the computer onboard. I was thinking more of using a smartphone or tablet for the display over wi-fi. You could have Interface builder do this:  I would be happy to help with the art work.

Andy Roid · Answer

Hello to @proteusy and All others interested, Help me understand this more. I went to the video player tool and realize a file can be called and played. I want to now know how to build the animated face. My first example would be a face looking straight at you. The next face would be the same but the eyes blink, next look left, etc. I assume this would be a bunch of short video clips which would be scripted together, and called on as needed. I guess my question now is does anyone know where software is that I can use to develop this face? I like the face @proteusy posted and want to build something on this idea. Ron R

Andy Roid · Answer

Because I have a limited knowledge, I was wondering and looking at a Bluetooth dongle for my computer which would connect to a tablet. Could it work? Ron R

Andy Roid · Answer

@proteusy, How does it work with the interface builder? I would like to see a simple example if you could make one. Ron R

Doombot · Answer

@ANDY Like I said earlier you could try a flash building program like swish...very easy to use. You could make your images on photoshop or even paint and edit your reaction together using a video editing tool, an easy one like windows movie maker or something like that, then export it as a .avi file

MovieMaker · Answer

The program that I had was on the LEAF Project. It had many animated faces Free.

Proteus · Answer

Hi Andy, the face builder interface is just an idea for DJ. As you can add buttons, labels, etc, in interface builder you could add face parts like eyes, mouth , nose, and make it display on the smatphone or tablet that would be on your robot. BTW: the robot on the pic is called Buddy from Blue Frog Robotics.

Nomad 6R · Answer

something like this?

Andy Roid · Answer

Hi @Nomad, Yes, You have the idea. I have not yet found a software I understand, but I will keep looking. I printed out a cartoon panda face and I will see if I can build it in paint. It is a challenge for me to draw a straight line, never mind a picture, but I will try. I will then see if I can make different expressions. End Goal to have my Adventurebot have a face. Hi @Doombot, Like I mentioned, I have NO artistic skills. You are able to build cool looking stuff from just stuff. I struggle writing my name...LOL. But I will try something. Ron R

Nomad 6R · Answer

there is an app from wowwee for robome has faces

Andy Roid · Answer

I tried to load Adobe Flash Player, but having trouble. Has anyone used it or also had trouble loading it? Ron R @Nomad I can't seem to find the software. I will keep looking.

Doombot · Answer

@ANDY Ok bro ill play around with stuff when I get home from work.

Nomad 6R · Answer

ANDY ROID go to app store and typ robome it has a few faces voices recording and internet connetion it works without the robots

Andy Roid · Answer

Thanks I will check it out.. Ron R

Nomad 6R · Answer

here is the app

Proteus · Answer

Only for ipone. Damm

Nomad 6R · Answer

not for android?

Nomad 6R · Answer

for the android app robome look for roboremote.last one is robome.

Andy Roid · Answer

It Won't work on my phone. Thanks for trying for me. Ron

Nomad 6R · Answer

there are tons off secondhanded cheap phones out there. on ebay .what phone do you have.

Andy Roid · Answer

Hi Patrick, My goal is not really using a phone, but using a tablet or even a computer screen. I want something like the faces posted by you and others. The apps give me the concept, but I am limited by using them. There is a program by Adobe, called Flash Player. It can allow you to draw a face and make it animated. ( like you see on the phone) This gives the ability to have the eyes move, blink, the mouth to move and the face to turn, etc. This way your screen, tablet or computer screen is the face. This then can be run by ARC. Dj explained how earlier in this post. By adding other thing like relays and servos, you can make a cool robot. I am working on loading Adobe Flash Player, and playing with it. Ron R

Nomad 6R · Answer

sounds great,tablet would be better then a phone. cant wait to see what you come up with.

Doombot · Answer

@ANDY That's what I've been saying all this time, flash. Look up a program called Swish. It's s simplified Macromedia Flash. You can make simple animations. You can then "export" (save them as...) them to video files, like .avi, so u you can pull it up on Video Player. I'll make an example when I get a chance.

Andy Roid · Answer

@Doombot Sorry I am so dense, LOL .. Brain fade from my youth,,, I will look up Swish. Thanks, Ron

thetechguru · Answer

@Ron, Yeah, you don't want to use Flash Player. It is a security nightmare and will be discontinued soon. Swish can use Flash to create the animations, but then turn them into videos that ARC can play with the Video Player object (found under misc controls). You tell it what to play with control command script commands:
 Video Player ControlCommand() examples... ControlCommand("Video Player", VideoPlay, "C:\My Documents\Video1.mpg") or ControlCommand("Video Player", VideoPlayLoop, "C:\My Documents\Video1.mpg", 20)

Alan

Andy Roid · Answer

Thanks Alan, I am still undecided on which software to use but it sounds like Swish will be my first try. I will download tutorials and the trial and see what I can do. The ARC steps seem pretty straight forward. Building the face and movement will be the work. Regards, Ron

Doombot · Answer

If you have to pay for Swish, I say just use something free like Windows Movie maker. Use jpg images and transition them together to create a pseudo animation...then save the file to .avi or whatever video file you want. You can go deep into detail and use a photo per letter...look at the guide below. It'll look more like realistic talking rather than just expressions...

Nomad 6R · Answer

hey andy i found this. face

Andy Roid · Answer

Hi @Nomad, It is something like I want to do. If you remember Eva from the Wallie movie and remember her eyes, that is what I want. I would add eyebrows and a mouth. The mouth shows up only when she speaks. All can be done with the EZB once the art work is done. Building the eyes eyebrows and mouth on the computer is not hard for someone who is good at drawing, but for me it is tough. I need to re-learn paint or something like it to be able to draw again. Forgetfulness is tough. I call it Brain fade...LOL Thanks for your help, Ron

Nomad 6R · Answer

that is great idea using eva eyes.

Andy Roid · Answer

@Doombot I guess I will try to draw the basic faces and do what you said. I can use a script to run it. Thanks, Ron

Andy Roid · Answer

I made a face, got it animated, transferred it to Movie Maker, ( a mp4 file). (My Movie.mp4) I can run it on my desktop, but the script displays the face, but won't run the file. Anyone have any ideas why it won't work?
ControlCommand("Video Player", VideoPlay,"C:\Users\Ron\Desktop\My Movie.mp4") Sleep(7000)

Thanks,

thetechguru · Answer

I would transcode it to mpg from mp4. The manual doesn't specify the supported video types, but the examples are all mpg. I suspect it also works with AVI and WMV but probably not every video type. Alan

Andy Roid · Answer

Thanks for the info. I changed it to a .wpl and it didn't work. I will keep trying

thetechguru · Answer

try mpg, avi, or wmv. wpl is a windows media player playlist, not a video format. You can't just change the name, you need to use your video creation software or transcoding software to re-encode it. Alan

Doombot · Answer

@ANDY You're getting there bud. A long time ago I tried to use my Acer w8 as a chest piece for one of my experiments, and I used a video of a live beating heart (pretty gory) on Video Player, in full screen. I must say the effect was pretty scary haha. I was prepping for an art installation a while back. But long story short, I used .avi and it worked fine. Keep trying man

Andy Roid · Answer

Yeah, I been using window media player, and converted it to a . wmv. Still ng. I can run the video in windows media player on my desktop, but not thru builder. With all my past test, when I start from scratch, I get the first frame, and that's it.

Andy Roid · Answer

Still NG, time for a break..

Doombot · Answer

@ANDY I'm trying to look for my project...I just can't remember what I did...ill post it if I do find it

Andy Roid · Answer

Thanks Man !

Mickey666Maus · Answer

Hey guys, just came across this....so I quickly scrubbed thru the previous pages, please forgive me if I am off topic! There is one thing that could help connecting your laptop screen and you phone, it is an app called https://trinusvr.com/ So if you managed to have all the stuff going on your PC you could just stream that window to you phone tablet or whatsoever and you animations would be displayed propperly....there are more apps doing this, but this one is by far the best one that I tested! Hope this helps, or is fun to check out

Doombot · Answer

@ANDY I can't find my old project dude, sorry. I'll see if I can make a new example project when I get home.

Andy Roid · Answer

@Mickey666Maus Thanks. Sounds good. I will look it over.. @Doombot No problem about the project. If you can or cannot make an example, Thanks.. I made a face in Power Point and animated it to look around and blink. I converted it to a .wmv file and it doesn't work thru the EZB, but works in media player.. I'll keep trying. Ron

Nomad 6R · Answer

this is it the face you want. face

Andy Roid · Answer

This looks good. I was thinking about using the Eve face from the Wallie movie. I thank you for helping me with the searches. I think the key is to keep it simple and mainly use the eyes only. (Like this last one you found). I will share my designs soon. Best Regards, Be Well, Ron

Nomad 6R · Answer

i found this too moving eyes

Nomad 6R · Answer

animation moving eyes

CochranRobotics · Answer

A lot can be done with some simple graphics.

Dnwx · Answer

I don't think this is what you want, but... If you want to keep a JD model in the same scale and have a tablet face, you could maybe 3D print a new head and incorporate the Sony smartwatch 3 in to the head. The Sony SW3 is just a watch strap and the watch itself sits within the strap. You could make watch faces that use and show expressions. Then also use IFTTT to send messages to twitter for the face to change at times of day or when you receive messages/emails, etc.

Nomad 6R · Answer

deleted post

Dunning-Kruger · Answer

@Nomad why does @Dnwx want to see Moviemaker's robot? Did he ask to see it?

Nomad 6R · Answer

oeps wrong topic sorry

Nomad 6R · Answer

andy was it you looking for eva'a eyes to use?

Nomad 6R · Answer

here's are eva's eyes animated and how to do it. eva's eyes

Andy Roid · Answer

Yes this is what I want ,,, and a how to do also.. Thanks Patrick !

Nomad 6R · Answer

goodluck.thumbs up.

EzAng · Answer

Has anyone figures out Andy's original question pertaining to animated faces on flat panels? I also would like to be able to call up animations smile, sad whatever animations. Are these animations called by scripts, maybe even reactive to voice synthesis etc. or eyes that follow you using the camera? EzAng

DJ Sures · Answer

This is what people use: https://synthiam.com/Support/Skills/User-Interface/Full-Screen-Video-Player?id=20421

EzAng · Answer

ok, Thanks I tried that, it works, I will play around with it. So to change face emotions, save different gifs or videos I have the Wio terminal: I got as far as the WIO terminal - no audio / speech , nor mouth moves etc. check my kink out https://youtu.be/GzJ97RnYYnM from: https://www.hackster.io/SeeedStudio/display-robot-face-using-the-wio-terminal-68f87a works great, but has no audio  This is the code I used for the Wio Terminal, how can it be used for a script in Synthiam? #include  #include  Servo myservo; //int outpin=D2; int counter = 0; int i = 0; static LGFX lcd; static LGFX_Sprite sprite(&lcd); int pos = 0; void drawEye(int x, int y) { sprite.clear(); sprite.fillCircle(65,65,60,0xFFFF); //sprite.drawEllipse(65,65,60,30,0xFFFF); //sprite.drawFastHLine(5,62,120,0xFF); sprite.fillCircle(x,y,15,0); sprite.fillArc(65,65,60,1,180,360,0xED6E); sprite.setPivot(65,65); sprite.pushRotateZoom(80,70,0,1,0.5); sprite.pushRotateZoom(240,70,0,1,0.5); } void sleepyEyes() { int p_rect[4][4] = {{9,65,112,22},{22,65,86,41},{40,65,49,55},{63,65,4,59}}; sprite.clear(); sprite.fillCircle(65,65,60,0xFFFF); sprite.fillCircle(65,70,10,0); //sprite.fillArc(65,65,60,1,180,360,0xED6E); sprite.setPivot(65,65); for (int i=0;i= 0; pos -= 1) { int l = pos; drawEye(l,80); myservo.write(pos); delay(80); } delay(3000); sleepyEyes(); }

Andy Roid

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