Top TechTop Tech #37: smarter drone, catching drone pilots, touching artificial limbs
Wait, is that a monkey… flying a drone?
— By Paul Worthington
Today’s Top Tech:
• Smarter drone flies itself while you shoot video
• Neutralization of malicious drones — and their pilots
• Improving artificial limbs’ touch
Smarter drone flies itself while you shoot video
It’s the “first drone designed with every aspect of the photographer’s experience in mind” — and with autonomous flight and camera control, 3D Robotics claims its Solo is “the world’s first smart drone” …which means “you have to do less,” the company says. “We’ve turned the Hollywood toolkit into software, and allowed everyone to experience epic video, both behind and in front of the camera.”
The quadcopter uses twin Linux computers (one on the craft and one in the controller) to “define its own flight, freeing users to focus on getting the shot,” The company says the drone’s intelligence “unlocks powerful and one-of-a-kind computer-assisted Smart Shots. Just set up the exact shot you want in real time, then tap “play” on the app and Solo will execute it with a level of precision and a soft touch that even seasoned cinema pilots can’t match. The effortless computer-assisted Smart Shot flight features allow even new pilots to capture professional aerial video from day one. Effortless flight means effortless filming — less flight control, more creative control.”
How smart is it? “Because we use the onboard computer’s processing power to do the heavy lifting,” the company adds, “the autopilot becomes the “brainstem,” exclusively focused on executing the rudiments of stable and reliable flight, while the computer serves as Solo’s “frontal cortex” and handles the higher-level processing; this task distribution dramatically reduces the likelihood of autopilot system failure during flight.”
The Solo is $999, and will fly 20 minutes per charge with the GoPro and gimbal.
There’s a preposterously pretentious launch video here. (shades of 2001)
…And a more straightforward presentation here.
Some other recent drone news:
• No drones at the Boston Marathon
• No drones or selfie sticks at the Kentucky Derby
• Amazon gets FAA exemption to test drone delivery
And if you’re worried about drones (and you should be) hey,
we got anti-drone drones on the way:
Neutralization of malicious drones — and their pilots
A French firm is building a drone that can hunt down other drones, and identify their pilots.
“Once a rogue drone has been spotted in the skies, the customized EC180 will chase it down and triangulate the position of its pilot,” Engadget reports. “The craft will then find the shadowy human, take their mugshot and alert nearby police as to their location in the hope of catching them in the act.”
Paris has been hit with a spate of anonymously-piloted drones flying over key landmarks, government buildings and even a nuclear power station,” Engadget notes. “It’s not been clear if it’s a group of amateurs with bad timing or something more coordinated, which has spooked the locals and law enforcement alike.”
“The prevention of unauthorized drone flights over sensitive areas has become a national challenge, “concurs robotics specialist ECA Group. The developer says its tech “can locate malicious drone operators in under a minute.”
The IT180 drone is equipped with multiple transponders. “It will locate the operator using its on-board technology… and identify the operator using its cameras,” the company says.
Why not simply shoot the offending drone out of the sky? Because you want to catch the bad buys, the company says. “Unlike the solutions available until now, which focus mainly on the neutralization of drones in flight, ECA Group has developed a solution that makes it impossible for malicious operators to disappear. This new system enables security forces to approach them discreetly and to catch them in the act of committing the offense, while collecting all the evidence required for future prosecution.”
…Of course, now the question arises: how will this system work against the smarter drones announced by 3D Robotics that can “fly themselves”?
Improving artificial limbs’ touch
Thanks to ‘muscles’ made of shape-memory wires, an artificial hand can respond sensitively.
Engineers at Saarland University made muscles from of nickel-titanium alloy shape-memory wire, Kurzweil AI reports. That’s wire that “remembers” its shape and returns to it after deformation. That let them fabricate “flexible, lightweight robot hands for industrial applications and novel prosthetic devices… The material has sensory properties allowing the artificial hand to perform extremely precise movements.”
Next up: Researchers at UCLA’s Biomechatronics Lab are designing artificial limbs that are more touch-sensitive, with “a language of touch” and “mechanical touch sensors that interact with objects of various shapes, sizes. and textures. They’re calling the result “artificial haptic intelligence” Kurzweil notes. The new AI algorithms record pressure, location (distance from end of finger in this case), and skin deformation — and “learn” to recognize human skin, for example.
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