Oribotics - the art/science of robotic origami

Firgelli PQ-12f Micro Linear Actuator

These are great. Micro Linear Actuators, made by Figelli.

I bought a couple and tested them, at the time they had 2 types of the PQ-12, an s for speed type, and an f for force type. We ended up going with the f for force. They aren’t cheap at US$53 each, but from our testing so far they are perfect for the job we have for them.

And my big shipment of 15 units just arrived all in order.

The geometry of leaf folding

It’s amazing what you can find out there, here I am, an artist working with robotics and origami, working on a new oribotic design, thinking about leaves. I turn to research for inspiration, and I start to follow a trail from the 2nd Origami Art and Science conference proceedings. It’s Biruta Kresling. I get the strong feeling that she’s understood the lines of thought ahead of me and is seeking these ideas in nature for design inspiration.

Then googling Biruta Kresling’s work on analysing natural structures for inherant folding patterns and design I came across The geometry of unfolding tree leaves by H. Kobayashi and others. Biruta is one of those others.

The essay presents me with a picture, and I can immediately imagine a robotic leaf, and I say to myself - ‘That’s it!’

Mylar as laminated hinge

Made an experiment today after reading that mylar was being used as a materia for solar sails. I thought if its good enough for NASA its good enough for me. The result is a quite springy waterbomb base. It has potential. I used a 75micro sheet laminated with 300gsm card.

Oribotics [giant]

It’s been a while since I last made an entry, been busy, got married had a baby, and applied for more funding (not necessarily in that order - the funding that is…)

So I thought I’d better come back with something BIG. Giant in fact.

This image is from a recent application to the Australia Council for the Arts, wherein I applied for funding to research the creation of giant oribots. Its been a long term dream and I’d love to build a big one a public artwork. The research grant is to prove the concept, and develop necessary documentation to make the build possible. We’ll see how it goes.

Network diagram

This is the network diagram that describes the relationships between audience, oribots and the various networks and computer functions. Its presented at a high level of abstraction, and the color coding is intergral to understanding the document. Take note of the colours used in the network field, and the colours used in the outline of the text description boxes.

Download this PDF to see the diagram with the full brief for the hardware programmer Ray.

Oribotics [network]

The next evolution of Oribotics will be oribotics [network]. Supported by Arts Victoria’s arts innovation fund. The work will premiere at Federation Square in Melbourne in October 2007. The work will consist of a new generation of folding robots that each have built in wifi and bluetooth networking.

The core project team is Matthew Gardiner and Ray Gardiner, the team that delivered the earlier two versions. We are extending the team in the production stage with an industrial design/fabrication company. I met the guys at Design Sense when working on Phillip Adam’s Origami work. They fabricated several large scale folding sets from small prototype designs, and so on that basis Design Sense will work on refining the design of the prototype robots to the final polished products.

Our project partners are Federation Square who are providing:
Studio space for the development of the work
Exhibition space in the Atrium

Aphids are auspicing the project, encompassing project and financial management, as well general support and assistance in securing additional funding or support from other arts bodies. All round good guys!

Computational Origami links

From a recent post on the Origami list, I have gathered some links to related origami/computation projects that exist on the web, in no particular order.

Josh Nimoy’s Virtual Origami
http://www.jtnimoy.com/itp/origami/sketch10/

John Szinger’s Foldinator Project
http://www.zingman.com/origami/foldinator.html

Jerome Gout’s Open Source Doodle
http://doodle.sourceforge.net

Jun Mitani’s ORIPA
http://mitani.cs.tsukuba.ac.jp/pukiwiki-oripa/index.php?ORIPA%3B%20Origami%20Pattern%20Editor

Robert Lang’s Treemaker
http://langorigami.com/science/treemaker/treemaker5.php4

Robert Lang’s Origami Simulator
http://langorigami.com/science/origamisim/origamisim.php4

Robert Lang’s Reference Finder
http://langorigami.com/science/reffinder/reffinder.php4

This post has been extended by another follow up post on the topic, these particular projects deal with origami simulation solutions such as curves, thickness of paper, layers, virtual object models for display and manipulation of a virtual origami model.

Sam Hasinoff implemented a method of simulating paper thickness:
Hasinoff, S. (2000) Exploring Computational Origami with iFold
http://www.cs.toronto.edu/~hasinoff/origami.doc

S. Miyazaki et al. cope with layers by storing relationships between paper faces:
Miyazaki, S.Y., Yasuda, T., Yokoi, S. and Toriwaki, J. I. (1996) ‘An origami playing simulator in the virtual space’, Journal of Visualization and Computer Animation, 7 (1): 25-42 Jan-Mar 1996,URL
http://www.om.sccs.chukyo-u.ac.jp/main/research/origami/journal/jvca.html

A more sophisticated simulation copes with “half-completed creases.” S. Miyazaki et al. implemented curved and curled paper (although this doesn’t seem to feature in the source code and executables that he released). Ron Burgoon, Zoe Wood, and Eitan Grinspun recently implemented a simulation with methods similar to that used for simulating cloth. They show curved folds and folds with dihedral angles other than 180 degrees:

Burgoon, R., Wood, Z. J. and Grinspun, E. (2006) ‘Discrete Shells Origami’ in Proceedings of CATA, Seattle, WA, March 2006,
http://www.csc.calpoly.edu/~zwood/research/pubs/origamiCATA06.pdf

Ida, T. (n.d.) Computational Origami Project URL
http://www.score.is.tsukuba.ac.jp/~ida/Ida2004/CompOrigami.htm

Zamiatina, L.I. (1994) ‘On Computer Simulation of Origami’, Mathematica in Education, Vol. 3 No. 3, Summer 1994 URL
http://library.wolfram.com/infocenter/Articles/1786/

Miyazaki, S.Y. (2004) ‘Origami Simulation’ URL
http://www.om.sccs.chukyo-u.ac.jp/main/research/origami/index.html

Studio GoGoGo (1999) * How To Make “VRML Origami” * URL
http://www1.plala.or.jp/Studio_GoGoGo/vrml/MakingOrigami/MakingOrigami.htm

Shimanuki, H., Kato, J. and Watanabe, T. (2003) ‘Recognition of folding process from origami drill books’ in Document Analysis and Recognition, 2003. Proceedings. Seventh International Conference on , (3-6 Aug. 2003) vol.1 p. 550 - 554
http://www.cse.salford.ac.uk/prima/ICDAR2003/Papers/0101_581_shimanuki_h.pdf

These urls were originally posted to the o-list, thanks to Hank Simon, and Tung Ken Lam.

Prototype flower

Here is some video for the prototype flower [7.7MB], and an animation showing the lever design for the November showing of oribotics.

Ars Electronica

Ars has been running for 2 days now. Its fantastic, the mood here is really positive with so much good work. This is just a short note to post this url of me and some other things on an Austrian radio website.

http://fm4.orf.at/gerlinde/205133/main

Tanteidan convention

We just finished the Tanteidan convention! My talk on Friday went down really well, my Japanese was clear and understood. I had many people approach me and comment on the talk and the project. They really loved the video of the construction of Origami house, and the next day we sold all of the Folding Australia books and tshirts. I’m really happy about that. It’s a nice boost for the 2007 Folding Australia convention, financially and socially. We made closer friends, as the Japanese slowly open up, and my language skills improve the gap between us gets smaller, and our communication starts to flow.

We move out of the apartment tomorrow morning, and we’re off on a tour via the Aichi Expo. The 3 Japanese guests had such a good time at our last convention so they wanted to thank us by inviting one of us on the tour. I felt a little uncomfortable, but Mr Yamaguchi insisted that it was appropriate, and what he says goes. Who am I to argue, in Japan the heirachy is very strong, and you dont argue with the boss, ever.

mY will have some photos on her blog soon…