Man Plays With Dog From Work With Robotic Surrogate

February 11, 2012 by Max Eddy via GeekoSystem.com -- Jordan Correa and his wife had a problem. Because they both worked full-time jobs, they weren't able to spend time at home during the day with their new dog Darwin. Instead of painfully readjusting their lives, Correa did what any man with training in robotics and engineering would do: He built a telepresence robot surrogate that he could control from work to play with his dog. You know, the obvious solution.

Correa's creation, which he calls DarwinBot, uses a Parallax EDDIE chasis and programmed with the Microsoft Robotics Developer Studio 4. Which is convenient, because Correa is a developer in Micorsoft's robotics division. The bot has several dog-friendly tools built in, such as a treat dispenser, a ball-launching ballista, a ball-retrieving robotic arm, and speakers so Darwin can hear his master's voice.

Using the onboard slate PC, Skype, and a pan-and-tilt webcam, Correa can interact fairly naturally with Darwin. The bot also packs a Kinect camera system on top for obstacle avoidance and a downward facing webcam for ball retrieval. The whole thing is controlled over the Internet with an XBox 36o controller.

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