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Edit: Kickstarter campaign failed in 2015.
Starting in 2025 you can build an interactive Alan by joining my Robotics Courseware (links coming soon). You can follow along with detailed video instructions starting with 3d printing parts. Off the shelf hardware components links are included with the BOM. Don't miss out! Be sure to get a head in robotics. Build at you own pace. Coming soon.
Introducing Alan, the android head robot platform kit, soon to be released on Kickstarter.
First a quick introduction. For those that may not know me. I've been a make up effects artist in the film industry for the past 23 years. Robots have always fascinated me since I was a kid growing up in Ohio and watching Lost in Space episodes. That interest never left me and when starting work in the film industry, I taught myself animatronics. That is I would be called upon to make something move via radio controlled, a puppet, or a toaster or ? As CGI took over the animatronics part of my industry, I focused my free time on using that knowledge for robotics. When I saw prosumer 3D printers come on the market 8 years ago, I knew I could get some of my ideas to the table with out the need for a garage full of CNC machines.
Alan is a culmination of of both technologies, animatronics and 3D printing. When this idea started 3 years ago, I had just found EZ Robots and knew that I could build an interestingly designed kit for everyone so they could experiment with robotics. A platform that personifies how we will interact with robots and androids in the near future, by looking them in the face.
My first challenge was to make sure I leaped over the "uncanny valley". To do so, I took the human dimensions and changed them a bit, eyes wider apart, downplayed high details and added features that were without a doubt not human and certainly robotic in form.
The second challenge was keeping the cost down for consumers. A head like this in the film industry, filled with lots of motions like brow, smile, etc would costs $10's of thousands of dollars. So I built Alan with a modular design in mind. Meaning that the store front will carry modules that will allow you to customize and upgrade the same robot without having to buy a whole new head. As an example the front subskull can be replaced with a module with brow movement, allowing you to keep the entire head and eye mechanism. Other silicone skins will become available different colors and genders, styles, etc. The low cost introductory head will include about 22 parts, easy to assemble, with the consumer supplying servos, power supplies EZB, etc. on their own. My website will include links to all the accessories needed, plus mods like LED eyes, built in audio systems and so on. All the parts will be molded and manufactured in Los Angeles. There will be no pressure injected molding of parts this time around. These are cold cast high impact plastic parts and platinum silicone skins. Alans future may include a full body, if the Kickstarter is successful. And you can certainly use this as a replacement head for InMoov . I will look at altering the open source STL files to be able to accept my heads.
I always knew that the EZB would be Alan's brains. And I will promote it as such. As we all know, DJ's commitment and advancement to the EZB is leading us into the future of robotics.There really is no other choice in my mind. But that's in part because I'm no programmer
D. Cochran's EZ-AI is a boon to Alans development. I look forward to where David takes it. And although I have it installed I have yet to implement it with Alan for a few more weeks. All of these working together will be highlighted on the Kickstater video.
I have several more weeks to finish the paint job and run a new hero silicone skin. Then there is the very important Kickstarter video. So we are at least 4 weeks out. But I will post here the links to both the Kickstarter and Alans website when they go live and as Alan progresses.
I look forward to your ideas for programming and how you would mod him. I'd also like to hear how you would like to see him develop. Thanks for your time and enjoy the development pictures and video.
All the best,
Will
Programming
Camera, Speech recognition, speech synthesis, pad touch,
Parts & Materials
Dynamixels, Arduino, USB camera, EZB 4, micro servos and regular servos
Other robots from Synthiam community
Ericez's I Create Baymax Doll Robot For Robot Theater Using...
Dunning-Kruger's Ez Dog (Inmoov Frankendog Failure)
Meant to also tell you guys that the camera in the forehead is no more. Its moving to the shoulder section right below the neck. This will allow you to set up tracking motions since the camera will be stationary rather than moving with the head..which caused alot of problems for any kind of motion tracking, etc. tracking etc.
Will, I'm so excited for you to see how this turns out and excited for me to possibly take your Master Class!!
For your poll, this would be my order:
will
HDD servo works best with ARC . i think most will use ARC . i was thinking just desame using an ID number .
I got my son started pretty young with the tinkering thanks to seeing DJ hacking items from thrift stores and such. We started the same and followed along for a quite a long time picking items up from a local thrift store and just turning them into something different. No remote. No problem. Just rip parts out and use ez-robot then make a small interface on phone and have fun. This moved over time to trying the same thing, but with raspberry pi's. I have helped my son progress over the years and he now owns a 3d printer, knows how to solder and even has the upper torso and head of Inmoov done.
After seeing the "Alan head" we were super impressed in a lot of ways as it was like an Alexa, but different and much more friendly. Being able to build one of these and give feedback would be super cool. We have a basic background now, but definitely not "experts".
Any idea as to the timeframe now for making a decision on being a "guinea pig" (yes we will sign an NDA) and building one and giving feedback?
hi all
if this goes thru . put your alan files on a cd-rom and remove them from your pc . you never know if there's hacker just passing by . be safe all .
Hi Nomad, I assume Will is going to encrypt the watermarked files for distribution but this certainly opens up the question, what happens if a watermarked file appears on the internet that has your unique code and you were not directly responsible for the leak. This type of security method is fairly easy to bypass if you have 2 different versions of the files and remove the unique identifiers through a file comparison but if this is the method Will wants to use I guess we will have to agree if we want to be participants.
It amazes about all the talk here about ways to get around things, leaks, etc. I have seen hundreds of projects succeed in the Opensource space and do it well. I have seen many projects fail as well. There is a way around every type security including crypto, cameras, watermarks, passcodes, etc., but I think the important thing here is for those that will be involved as testers or beta testers to just be responsible. In my opinion its like a password. Don't stick the sunshine makes me smile under you keyboard, don't write on a piece of paper on your wall. Don't use it as a background on your phone. My now 16 year old only uses a password keychain and all over 16 characters and considered strong. This is just one example. If you want to talk about how to give the files out and track them, then there is plenty of simple membership sites that can be sent up with encrypted codes (only good for 14 days) and one time use and other ways like dropbox with only the one email per user, etc. It just depends on how secure.
On the other side of things, I would rather hear about the benefits of being a tester, what all is included, what all is needed, etc. In my opinion this should be more about marketing/advertising and hyping up what Will is doing here and helping promote it as he has something a bit unique that he has done and he is hopefully finally going to share it. Thanks a bunch Will.
hi nink
maybe an uniek code on a cd-rom ? insteadt off sending files ? this topic shows that talking about all off this is needed . there's another kink in the cable and that is the bying time, is not so perfect . with the russian war . hight cost house heating, people are strugling to get arround each month .
hi mtwannabe
a one time file use is not a good idea . when sending files to diff comps , its possible messurments changes . so you have to be able to mod the , file els you cannot put your alan together . ive seen allot files change , messurement up to more then 1 mm . so you have to be very lucky that , all files and prints succseed in 14 days .