The coolest thing you’ve ever seen a robot do is no longer parkour, it’s a robot that finds, retrieves and delivers tool bags to workers.
This week, Boston Dynamics posted my latest Atlas Robot demonstration video (opens in a new tab), but this one is different. In previous videos, we have seen the humanoid robot, walking on two legs, walking, running, jumping, climbing stairs and doing parkour. We’ve even seen it perform synchronized dances with a robotic dog (Place), but we’ve never seen anything like this.
In Boston Dynamics’ first human-starring scenario, a construction worker is building a scaffold until he realizes he’s forgotten his tools. Import the atlas. The familiar robot is now equipped with a gripper. In the video, it appears to find its way to the workers, including finding a wooden plank and making a bridge between the stairs and the scaffolding.
Atlas then locates the tool bag, grabs it, walks up the stairs, crosses the plank, and when it’s just one step below the work floor, expertly throws the bag to the worker.
Of course, Atlas couldn’t get down like a normal worker and after pushing a giant wooden box off the pedestal, he jumped onto it and bounced off the box and landed on the ground.
It’s fun to watch unless you’re a construction worker worrying about your job.
For technologists, this routine is a feat of engineering and programming. In a follow up video (opens in a new tab), Boston Dynamics engineers explained how they programmed Atlases’ built-in software to use two cameras (one for color imaging and the other for depth placement) to identify and find objects. There’s also new programming to ensure that when Atlas lifts, throws, and moves objects, it can understand the force the objects are exerting on its body and doesn’t tip over when lifting heavy objects.
In other words, Atlas must use its body the same way humans do when lifting and carrying packages around.
“One of the hardest things about taking objects and moving them around with a robot is that it creates a whole new set of challenges in trying to decide where the object I’m manipulating and how it moves,” explains one person at Boston Dynamics. engineer in the video.
To be as impressive as Atlas’ moves, programming is first done in a simulation to understand how any of these moves might work on a real robot. Atlas doesn’t know how to do anything. Simulation can work, but Boston Dynamics must constantly reprogram and reconfigure the robot to try and execute these moves. The final flip with a spin (or “sick trick” as referred to in the video) is something Atlas couldn’t do as recently as a year ago.
It makes you wonder what Atlas will be able to do within a year. The plan is for such a robot to eventually go into production or construction, but we think it could prove quite handy in the home as well.
