By Andrew Liszewski
The picture above probably won’t make much sense until you watch the video I’ve included below. That is unless you’re already familiar with torso-less robot hobos walking around pushing shopping carts. In that case you probably won’t find this video as funny as I did.
Carlos was actually designed for a college project and was intended to be a study of how robots could be used to help the less fortunate.
Carlos was a college kinetic sculpture project. I was interested in the concept of automating aspects of society that were considered not so “glamorous”. Robotics are often used in environments which are considered dangerous to humans. Deep sea exploration, nuclear cleanup and volcanism are some of the “higher profile” adverse environments which robots are used. My question was, “What about other dangerous or hazardous areas?”. For example, homeless people live in extremely dangerous environments. Shouldn’t there be automated equipment used by this strata of society?
I’m not sure how the catching on fire part comes into play, but it makes the Hobo-bot all the more entertaining to watch. And it’s particularly interesting to see people walking by trying to ignore the robot, just like they would ignore an actual homeless person.
[ Walking Shopping Cart ] VIA [ MAKE: Blog ]
