Robotics
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In a recent post I mentioned a trip to Amsterdam to visit with Van Wijnen and MX3D. The press embargo has now lifted on MX3D's bridge – as you can see from a slew of recent articles – so I can now share a bit more information about that part of the visit. During that week I spent 2.5 days at MX3D, mostly to participate in discussions about how best to instrument the bridge with sensors. Autodesk started our collaboration with MX3D around the vision of using generative design for the creation of the bridge's form… during the last year…
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Colleagues in Autodesk's Office of the CTO (OCTO) – who work in the robotics lab on Pier 9 – have just released the code for a new tool called Mimic. Mimic is an open source plugin – with the Python code posted on GitHub – that allows you to simulate and control the use of a number of industrial robots (including various robots from ABB and KUKA). Here's a screenshot: I'm really happy to see OCTO releasing open source projects in this way. If you're interested in contributing to the project, be sure to check out the developer notes. There's…
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During a 3-day event, this week, Autodesk opened its Advanced Manufacturing Facility (AMF) in Birmingham, the UK's second largest city. Here's a video showing some information about this very cool facility. It's one of 6 technology centres that Autodesk is running at various locations around the world. The others are Pier 9 in San Francisco, the Boston BUILD Space, Autodesk Toronto's new MaRS office, the VR Center in Munich and the Materials Lab in Kilsyth, Australia. My team is proud to have been asked to provide technology to be showcased at the AMF: Dasher 360 is running there, providing access…
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I've been interested in participating in – or at least attending – an AEC Hackathon for a couple of years now. I was first introduced to them during the VR Hackathons I attended in SF in 2014 and 2015 (Damon, Greg and Paul, who help organize the AEC Hackathons, were also organizing/involved in/attending the VR ones). There are a number of AEC Hackathons planned for Europe over the coming months, so I'm happy to say I'll finally get my chance. I've been asked to present at the first – which is in Munich from March 31st – April 2nd –…
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Madeline Gannon's exhibit – featuring Mimus, the industrial robot that reacts to (and even interacts with) visitors – opens tomorrow (November 24th, 2016) at the Design Museum in London. I mentioned Madeline's project in a recent post as I'd had the chance to interact with it at the Autodesk Boston BUILD space. There's also an interesting article discussing the project that's just been posted over on In the Fold. Here's a video describing the motivation behind the project in more depth: If you're interested in how Mimus looks when not surrounded by glass, here's the video I recorded…
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Yesterday afternoon I popped down to the Case à Chocs in Neuchâtel to see the first of the robots being set up for tomorrow's big event – Design Night Switzerland, celebrating 25 years of Autodesk's presence here. (At the time of writing, there are still tickets left: get yours from here.) The first arrival was courtesy of Rollomatic's Humanoid Power division: they've configured one of their robots to perform that most important of tasks, serving beer. Prospective drinkers get to choose between a "Blonde" and an "Eve", two products from the Cardinal brewery in Fribourg. I'm already know…
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The countdown is on… the first Design Night Switzerland is being held at la Case a Chocs in Neuchâtel on October 20th, 2016 to celebrate Autodesk Switzerland's 25th anniversary. (It's actually very timely, as la Case has celebrated its own 25th birthday, this year). The theme for the event is robotics: as I've mentioned before on this blog, some of the first automata – in fact the ones that inspired the movie Hugo – were invented in la Chaux-de-Fonds (also in the canton of Neuchâtel), so there's a long history in the region. And with the world about to embrace…
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My father used to take me to the Design Museum in London when I was a child: he was a graphic designer and deeply passionate about typography and all other things design-related. I have fond memories of those visits. When visiting The Boston Build Space a few weeks ago, I had the chance to meet with Madeline Gannon, who (it turns out) was working on an upcoming exhibit for the newly relocated Design Museum (it's moving from Butlers Wharf to Kensington High Street, and Madeline's exhibit will be one helping inaugurate the new space in an exhibition entitled "Fear and…
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I arrived in Toronto on Sunday afternoon. Customs and immigration was extremely efficient – I just had to wait a while for my bag (one of these days I'll manage to do an 8-day trip with just a carry-on, but not this time). Getting into downtown Toronto was a breeze, too, with the UPExpress from Pearson Airport to Union Station (I'm guessing UP stands for Union-Pearson). It even has free wi-fi – a blessing for international roamers such as myself. Despite its size – and Toronto is *huge* – the downtown area is surprisingly walkable. I don't have a step…
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After the fun of participating in last week's Hackathon, I headed across to Bern for SINDEX 2016. SINDEX is a biannual exhibition focused on industrial automation. I went to the last one and found it really interesting – well worth going back to, especially given my involvement in IoT and my interest in robotics. The event is probably a smaller, Swiss version of the Hannover Messe, although I'm only really guessing as I've never been there. It was also a good chance to meet with a few companies who will be exhibiting their products at the upcoming Design Night Switzerland…