SOUNDUP, TURN COMPUTER, RC, mouse off screen, ClickerHello…my name is gabriella Levine.I’m going to tell you a little bit about my own work and my time here at Instructables this summer as Artist in Residence--MORE PHOTOS INSTRUCTABLSE, more pics of this one…
I love snakes – and always have. II’ve grown up keeping terrariums and aquariums of snakes.These are 4 snakes I got to know quite well in Arizona while researching desert snakes. --More pics?
I’ve even eaten rattle snakes 2 times for dinnersTaking photo claire central california are preparing roasted rattle snake--
I am fascinated with the sinuous way that snakes move. A lot of my work is inspired by investigating this wave like motion that is not only inherent to snakes but to all organic creatures. --Inpsiration…
A lot of my work is DRIVEN BY USING structures and processes occurring in the natural world, and applying them to the designs of the work I’m fabricating. This is called BIOMIMICRY.3. SOME EXAMPLES of biom sys, include –modelling the flexibility of an elephant trunk . modeling-lightweight structure of birds that allow them to fly--protei
One project I’m working on is a biomimetic sailing robot called Protei AS depicTed here. -A open source COMMUNITY DRIVEN, INT’L project to develop a new technology for an ocean cleaning robotic sailboat, -cheap to build & sustainable
Hereare two of the Protei prototypes. Last summer worked on this 10m version with the Protei team in Rotterdam, and this summer, I’m hard at work for the 10th prototype-Through TESTING, Snakelike vehicle , rather than hulled boat, maneuvers more efficiently while pulling heavy load like garb..
Well, after last summer,As my own NEXT STEP for protei, I thought that a swimming snake might be good underwater exploratory tool. So I made a physical framework of a robotic snake in December.This here is the FIRST prototype for swim snake robot that is driven by multiple motors throughout the body. And I put it on Instructables. .
Moving ahead a few months: I graduated ITP in May, the Art and Tech school at TischI came to be an Artist in Resident at Instructables.And this is my introduction.
IT was the 72 hour build for the Team Instructables Red Bull Challenge : The Psycho Scooter Scramble was the name of the game. We didn’t win according to red bull but it was a winner in my mind.
I quickly started documenting various electronics projects related to wireless communication, control, data collection, using arduino , as well as water related endeavors. Like using Arduino and a data logging shield to plot your path.
Vacuum forming an electronics enclosure (I did my best to get some hands on work with some new tools and techniques).
Visualizing sensor data in just a few steps
Wireless communication
Waterproofing servo motors
Underwater battery packs using D cells and building a wireless remote control transmitter and receiver.
I also spent a lot of time at Tech Shop, learning many new techniques of fabrication. I spent a lot of time there with Cesar Harada, working on Protei prototype ten. And I’ve documented on instructables a lot of the techniques used for this endeavor, especially the electronics, communication, and control.
Most of my work at Instructableswas devoted to making Sneel, my robotic swimming snake. So I documented on Instructables the fabrication of the mechanics, the software architecture, the hardware behind it, and the waterproofing methods.
and here’s a little abt the software development physical fabrication.
1. locomotionis driven by motors acting as joints rotate back and forth based on sine wave function propagating down body.2. In order to achieve this I replicated a snake’s undulation in SOFTWARE, 3. I made Graphical reps of the output angles of each motors over time, 4.x axis corresponds to time; y axis corresponds to angle; each colored line corresponds to a different motor, or dot, from the animated simulation5.See each motor rotating SINE WAVE slightly out of phase from each other, as the wave undulates from the head to toe.--Software libraryThese are graphs I made software motions studies looking at the servos and the amplitudeEPLAIN a graph!!! NEW GRAPH NO M!!! Each line represents the motion of an indiv servo, slightly out of phase, in each successive servo propagating the same waveHead sends it to next vertebrate etcSome simulation
I wrote a software library to easily generate wave locomotion based on motor oscillation.
-diagram of the control firmware & relationship between the classes.
Each loop cycle, The main program, AT THE TOP -references a class that propagates a sine wave down a line of motors. -listens to a wireless RC protocol communicating to the snake joystick
2 CLASSES implemented-IworteservoWave class to control wave behaviro, and I use Arduino servo library to contorl each motor
The servo wave class controls wave period, wavelength and amplitude.
-visualization of the type of built in control for the wave structure,By modifying wavelength, period, and amplitude of the wave.
-in future I plan to implement sensor class to address issues like semi-autonomous behavior for obstacle avoidance , way point followingsosneel can swim by himself. -narrow sea caves and rough ocaen conditions and still return home
-The ultimate goal was to take some underwater 123d catch , and perhaps take a trip to the aquarium. I have yet to do get the swimming to be smooth enough for 123d but I am working towards it . But I did test out goPro and Sneel swims pretty alright.
I will continue to work on Sneel to eventually get it to explore unknown territories and extreme environments . The practical applications of robot snakes: crisis management and natural disaster reliefsearch and rescue; fire management; -Finding leaks in pipelines-crushed buildings or crashed cars;rescue
Overall my time here was amazing (and I spent a lot of late nights here as in this photo), I’m going to miss psycho scooter and I’m really going to miss all of you. The resources are amazing and the community is amazing, and I love what the website does, and I’ll keep documenting my work .. I d really love to come back and build more!
Thank you Turn it on
Moving onto the BODY of Sneel, -Each JOINT is a servo MOTOR that mimics a snake VERTEBRATE.-The joints are linked together using titanium BRACKETS which altogether replicate a SPINAL COLUMN structure
-The ACTUATION of the motion is controlled by a microcontroller, located in the front of Sneel, serving as the BRAIN.-The WIRES sending the SIGNAL from the brain to the body run through the entire body, like NERVES.
ELECTRONIC ARCHITECTURE and the hardware elements all based on OPEN SOURCE platforms: arduino, zigbee
WATERPROOFING Sneel was a challenge, but accomplished using a lot of epoxy and glue.Each joint, SEAL IN SKIN-I didn’t want him to leak anywhere or get hurt… so I spent so many hours making sure… then finally I got him ready to go swiming--