Robotic Arms, and The Beginning of cloudpainter

So we have long realized this, but now we finally have a plan.  For this painting robot to truly be able to express itself, it needs arms.  So we are planning on adding a pair, if not four.  A conceptual 3D model showing where we would put the first two can be seen below.

So the way we are thinking about this whole robot coming together is to add a pair of robotic arms above the painting area.  They would hold brushes, or maybe a brush and a camera.  Still deciding on this.  But as currently envisioned, the XY table will control the airbrushes, and the arms will control the traditional artist brushes.  Lots of reasons for this, least of which we think it will look cool for them to dance around each other.

We expect to have one of the robot arms, a 7bot, here in a couple of days.  Can't wait to see what we can do with it. 

Another thing we are realizing is that this is beyond the scope of the Neural Jet.  This new robot, a machine with a modular paint head on an xy-table and two robotic arms, is sort of a new project.  So from here on out while the Neural Jet will refer to the modular paint head, the project in its entirety will be referred to as cloudpainter, and will encompass all the tech and algorithms from all of my previous robots.

Refined Paint Head (Model R)

Based on the initial prototype, which we were actually very pleased with, we went back to the white board and tackled some of its shortcomings.  The primary issue we had to address was how was a robot arm or xy-table going to hold on to this thing.

That was when Hunter came up with the idea of supporting the entire paint head from the center with 2" bolts.  So we redesigned the tray to hold 9 2" 6-32 bolts.  Above these bolts an aluminum disk would serve as the mounting surface.  With this configuration any module that consisted of a 40 degree arc with a 3.5" radius, could just snap into place.

As always, here is the final Google Sketch file so anyone that wants to can design this along with us.

Modular Approach?

So the idea of going modular came up, and it just makes sense.

At the design meeting we decided to make a paint head that was versatile enough to be mounted on either a 3D arm or an XY Table. Why stop with the customization there? The new concept is to give the paint head a configurable set of mark making tools from which it can operate.  We are having another design meeting this weekend to go into the particulars.  This picture though shows a rough first conceptualization of a nine module system.

Oh... also in keeping with the open source nature of this project, here are the google sketch-up documents to go along with this mock-up.  We plan on sharing everything so anyone can follow along and contribute.

Initial 3D Sketches of Paint Head Complete

Though its probably obvious, the name of this new robot is a blend of Neural Nets and InkJets.  The main idea being that it will use artificial intelligence to spray paint onto a canvas with jets of air. This initial sketch shows how this will be accomplished with an array of six airbrushes. Final design  will include traditional brushes as well, but we will build that around this airbrush array as our experience is that paint delivery is the most difficult part of any painting robot.  That is our primary goal, the delivery of paint to the brush and canvas.

Six airbrushes are being used so that a full color gamut can be achieve. The pigments in five of the air brushes will be cyan, magenta, yellow, black, and white. The final airbrush will either have a "guest" pigment, or a paint thinner, perhaps water?  Not sure yet.  

The two most interesting aspect of this are why white and a thinning agent are being included.

The reason for the white is that the Neural Jet will be using creative feedback loops (see my TEDx Talk for details). This robot will need the ability to both add and subtract saturation.  Unlike an inkjet printer that knows exactly what it will be printing and uses the white of the page, this robot will be re-evaluating each brush stroke and mark continuously, and repainting areas constantly.  As such it will need the ability to lighten areas, and even erase by white washing.  

The reason for the thinning agent is many fold, most importantly for brush washing and texture.  We are still working out the final details, but this robot will have a brush and brushes need cleaning, so it would be nice to be able to apply pigments and clean them from the brush with this paint head.  Another reason for a sixth airbrush is that it might be interesting to have a mystery fluid that simply gets mixed in once in a while to add texture.  I am not sure what exactly will be needed, but I just feel like later in the process I will be wishing I had an extra airbrush, so I am including it in the initial design.  Hope I don't end up needing two extra airbrush heads.