tingilinde

mechanical gifs

Theo Gray was a co-creator of Mathematica.  He has developed some transparent machine kits to explain the functioning of mechanical objects.

two drones used to do motion capture

Motion capture is very tricky.  Normally three synchronized and position calibrated cameras are used.  Here two drones follow someone. They still wear the image targets common in motion capture and the cameras have filters to only "see" those targets.  It is still an early proof of concept, but this is very promising for animation, physical therapy and sports.  

 

 

The paper 

 

Flycon: Real-time Environment-independent Multi-view Human Pose Estimation with Aerial Vehicles

TOBIAS NÄGELI, AIT Lab, ETH Zurich
SAMUEL OBERHOLZER, AIT Lab, ETH Zurich SILVAN PLÜSS, AIT Lab, ETH Zurich
JAVIER ALONSO-MORA, Delft University of Technology OTMAR HILLIGES, AIT Lab, ETH Zurich

 

We propose a real-time method for the infrastructure-free estimation of articulated human motion. The approach leverages a swarm of camera- equipped flying robots and jointly optimizes the swarm’s and skeletal states, which include the 3D joint positions and a set of bones. Our method allows to track the motion of human subjects, for example an athlete, over long time horizons and long distances, in challenging settings and at large scale, where fixed infrastructure approaches are not applicable. The proposed algorithm uses active infra-red markers, runs in real-time and accurately estimates robot and human pose parameters online without the need for accurately calibrated or stationary mounted cameras. Our method i) estimates a global coordinate frame for the MAV swarm, ii) jointly optimizes the human pose and relative camera positions, and iii) estimates the length of the human bones. The entire swarm is then controlled via a model predictive controller to maximize visibility of the subject from multiple viewpoints even under fast motion such as jumping or jogging. We demonstrate our method in a number of difficult scenarios including capture of long locomotion sequences at the scale of a triplex gym, in non-planar terrain, while climbing and in outdoor scenarios.

 

copper and steel

A remarkable staircase in Copenhagen.  It will be interesting to see what it looks like as the copper ages - assuming it isn't coated.

 

 

 

it's great when

Science students reach out to younger kids to show them the wonders and weirdness of nature

 

the z-box

The force behind the inexpensive harpsichord kit dies.  Over the years I've seen several finished examples.. some were very good.  Now the company is a resale point for finished instruments..  some go for a lot of money.

 

 

a math professor writes to a cat food company

suggesting one with the diameter equal to the height would be more efficient.

they replied

why landing on mars is hard

old, but relevant 

olivia hooker

A remarkable life - a survivor of the 1921 Tulsa race riots who went on and did things.. many things.

 

 

 

matt green's walk

probably a fun indie film

a holiday piece

not a conventional commercial - the full Apple holiday piece

 

 

and its making