Great King Kizer is Eco-Friendly AND introducing the New King Kizer

 Kudos to the organizers and sponsors of the first All-Earth Ecobot Challenge ! The event which was held in Houston on April 25 was a huge success. 

 The MARU Family was there and I promised to post some pictures. Unfortunately, due to the fact that I was up on stage with them during the demos working as an interpreter, I don't have any photos of the actual demo. But here are some pictures and videos during preparation.

 Great King Kizer and the 2 smaller soccer playing robots awaiting their turn.

 Of course, Great King Kizer is famous as a battling robot, but since the event was geared around protecting the environment, it showed off some eco-related tasks. (The tasks were the assigments for the EcoBot competition and the teams used the LEGO MINDSTORMS Education NXT kit to accomplish them.) 

 First, the robot was shown teleoperated using a custom-made motion synchronizer. On stage, Naoki Maru was standing right next to the robot, but the basic idea is that in the future we will be able to operate the robot remotely through our computers and network.

 Next was the trash sorting demo. This time Great King Kizer was put in autonomous mode. The robot was handed either a used plastic bottle, can or paper package and was able to distinguish which one it is using image recognition. Then it looks at each trash bin to figure out where to put it. It takes a little while for the robot to determine the correct bin since it is using an inexpensive camera module from an old cell phone (great example for the recycling theme). On stage, Naoki asked the audience to choose the objects to sort to prove that the robot was not preprogrammed. 

 Other demos were related to baseball and soccer. Here are a couple of pictures of the same demo but at the residence of the Consulate General of Japan in Houston. There was a reception there preceding the event. Great King Kizer was able to pitch a ball and the soccer robots showed off a throw-in.

 

The last day was set aside for visiting local schools. It was fascinating to watch the students getting all excited with the demos. I believe that robots can play a great part in in the future in strengthening the ties of friendship across borders.

 And now for some extra news! The MARU Family has developed a new robot - New King Kizer. You can get a glimpse of it here. Naoki believes that it is the "first humanoid in the world that can jump sideways." It is 60cm tall and weighs only 3kg since it uses only HALF the number of motors that Great King Kizer has. Also it uses PET (polyethylene terephthalate) for its frame which adds another eco-friendly aspect to the robot. More on the New King Kizer soon.......