Team 1986 introduces our Guitar Hero Robot
 

FRC 1986, Team Titanium, would like to introduce TITAN, our new Guitar Hero Robot.

Anyone who had the chance to see the guitar hero machine at the National Instruments booth in Atlanta this year can understand why we were inspired to build one of our own. We came home from Atlanta thinking somehow, some way, we must have one of those. After a whole summer of experimenting, programming, testing, prototyping, building, and tinkering, we have a GH bot!

The big challenge was to build a bot that could perform the demanding machine vision task, and the high speed mechanical task, for a low cost that we could afford. We could not spend thousands of $$$ on the kind of high-end hardware in a system like NI's. NI uses their robot to showcase their industrial vision system and I/O controller, as well as some nice pneumatics. If we were going to do this, we needed to accomplish it with much less hardware.

Initially we assumed that the frame rate and picture quality of a typical web cam couldn't possibly do the job. And that a typical computer using USB I/O probably wasn't sufficient either. Both assumptions turned out to be wrong. This robot runs in LabView on a Dell laptop, with USB video from an inexpensive web cam, and USB output to a solid state relay board. Our initial experiments with video techniques in LabView were very encouraging, and showed us we could do the note recognition and outputs well enough to proceed further. So we spent some money on the mechanical piece, and after some "finger" prototypes using low-voltage solenoids, we were convinced that a robot could be built within our means. But we had no idea if it could perform well enough to even be interesting. We did some design work, and spent the summer making parts and getting it together.

Several others besides NI have built guitar hero robots (just do a search), mostly college lab projects. But many have taken shortcuts such as intercepting the video signal from the game console, attaching sensors to the TV screen, or outputing electrical signals directly to the guitar. We thought it was important to build a robot that had no advantage over a human opponent. It must watch the TV and play the guitar just like a human would. Rather than clamping the guitar into a frame or fixture, we thought it would be much more fun to build a life size, free-standing figure that held the guitar and played alongside its opponent. The hand mechanisms attach to the guitar, and the guitar hangs freely on the robot. We used PVC pipe to build a body, vacuum hose for arms, and the controlling laptop sits on top as the robot's head. We found a good deal on a LCD TV, and built a stand and camera mount so we have a complete package for demos. In addition to an entertaining promotional demo, we plan to use him for fundraising. For a donation you can play against the robot....after school, at football & basketball games, at the street fair, maybe even at hired gigs for parties, etc. Hopefully he can at least help pay for himself.

Many hours of trial and experimentation got the bot to where it is today. It performs beyond our wildest expectations. It routinely scores in the upper 90's in accuracy on expert level on almost any song, and can beat even the best players. But it can be turned down to lower difficulty levels when desired. We designed it to use the whammy bar and the star power bonus to help it be competative. It can be beaten....there are some songs it is not quite as good at. But at the typical demo playing with the public, it will seem virtually unbeatable to most folks.

So here is a youtube video peek....we are excited to share it with the FIRST community!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VLQhX0nZV6I


Team Titanium 1986
Lee’s Summit West High School
Lee’s Summit, MO

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

I just recently saw the NI demo from under my rock and thought it would be a cool project to raise the team's skill level in a variety of ways. Your video, however, is WAY cooler than it was in my head. Kudos for an awesome demonstration piece. I am inspired.

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

That is beyond words.

Insanely impressive is all I can say.

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

Agreed!
An off-season project that can help pay for itself.

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

. . . wow . . .

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

...omg

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

That is simply amazing! :D And a great off-season challenge as well!

I have one question. Can it start starpower mode? :D

EDIT: Never mind. Just saw it do that. :D

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

Now I understand why our comp sci guys wanted to ditch the game this year and make something like this... Awesome.

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

Awesome. Next challenge.... Mario Kart

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

What normal human can comfortably hold and play a guitar with all five fingers from the left hand on the front of the guitar?

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

Absolutely fantastic, and very impressive.

OK, now what WE all want to know....how'd you do it, exactly? Details!!

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

Seconded, You guys always seem to build great stuff, but this is just stunning.

Keep up the good work! Hope you use this to help grab a second Chairman's!

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

this is a tangential issue.

I like the way the video was shot. What kinda of camera ? what was the 'workflow' ? what video editing software ?

Ed

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

Maybe we will savor it for awhile before we give out too many trade secrets.

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

Just a simple Sony hard drive camcorder, and some editing with Windows Movie Maker. No workflow, just winged it.

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

awesome awesome awesome!!!!

This is the dream off season project for any team!!!

great job guys!!!

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

indeed impressive, and it looks professional at that! im guessing this wast a cheap piece of hardware

how does it do when there is no discernible separation between the notes? (see: knights of cydonia)

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

excellent. another example of how it is possible to make a really good video without a hollywood production company.

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

all you need to do now is make it to where, every time it get's the star power, it ignores the lightening that messes it up.

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

I wouldn't call it cheap, but at least within our means.

Adjacent notes such as in Knights of Cydonia are a problem, and the robot cannot play them. Simply no way to see them with no separation. My understanding is that the NI bot and other bots have the same issue, but I do not know for sure where they are with that. We have a short "I can't play that as well" list.

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

Yes the lightening is a problem. Very hard to differentiate a lightening flash from a note. Sometimes it causes an error, sometimes it doesn't. Ironically, it happens only when you are doing well and would least want it to happen, when you are in a streak heading into star power.

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

No no no! The dream off season project is a Guitar Hero playing T-shirt cannon with crab drive!

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

I want to see someone modify a guitar so instead of hitting the keys externally it shorts the wires internally, then hide all other electronics necessary inside the guitar. then mount the camera somewhere, like on the ceiling, where no one would see it. Then play against people and just hit random buttons, and still win. :yikes:

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

This is probably the most epic robot that I have ever seen. Its quite amazing what FIRSTers will do next... :D

I know some guys in my school that would LOVE to play against this robot.

Why stop there??? :cool:

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

We are hoping that will be the case for a lot of people when we take it out for fundraising.

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

Hmmm, there is still a couple months isn't there?? Thanks for the Idea!! ;)

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

For want of a better term, Epic Win. I think next time I get challenged in Guitar Hero I may have found a way of not failing miserably. So, when can we expect details on the code? You used Labview to do it, I wonder how possible it would be with a fully open source solution such as OpenCV. Also, why did you decide to use solenoids instead of servos?

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

We're a little queezy about giving away the recipe for this robot so soon. We are just rolling it out, so give us some time to get some experience with it ourselves. Basically we are using Labview with the vision tools that came in the 2009 KOP to watch the right places on the screen and determine when a note has passed. I would have to ask our programmer about using another platform. He is a Labview whiz, so he would probably say to any FRC team "if you have access to Labview, why would you use anything else?"

As to servos, in my opinion they would be overkill for this application. This job calls for short, linear, repetative actuations with no variation, just what solenoids are good at. Servos are for having accurate and variable control of speed and position. You can drive solenoids with a simple on/off output for a small fraction of the cost of eight servo systems, and probably with faster response.

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

Wow, this is amazing.

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

okay.... you got me chris... i know what im having my team work on this next offseason

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

It kinda like a modern day Deep Blue, except it plays Guitar Hero. Awesome job!

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

Funny you should mention that. One of the existing guitar hero robots out there is called "Deep Note," named obviously after the famous chess playing computer Deep Blue. It is one of those that I mentioned which takes some short-cuts in our opinion. It attaches photo-sensors directly to the screen, and outputs electrical signals directly to the guitar. It has had its share of publicity, and touts its own web site, but we think our genuine TV-watching, guitar playing robot is much more interesting.

Here it is: http://mechanizedrock.com/

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

This makes me proud to be an alumni of 1986, and a reason I come back for more.

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

That is awesome. It looks better then the one a nationals. :D

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

The robot was featured today on a local TV station...the link is below. We are having fun sharing it with our school and community.

http://www.kctv5.com/video/20986818/index.html

and in another segment here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oPz1nmK9Dbs

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

I would like to see it attempt Through the Fire and flames.

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

We have had lots of questions/requests about TTFATF. This was sort of discussed earlier in this thread, although they were asking about Knights of Cydonia. We have to admit that the the bot has trouble with songs that have lots of zero-separation notes like TTFATF-expert. Simply can't distinguish the notes with no separation. As I mentioned earlier I believe the NI and other GH bots have the same issue, but we can't really speak for them. So yes, it could play it, but would lose to a good player. If its any consolation, he CAN play TTFATF-HARD!

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

that is so cool you guys! im amazed. im a big fan of team titanium. if you guys ever want to throw down, im from team 2560 in grandview MO. you should come to one of our socials. it would be a good chance to make a connection.

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

We have had a few KC area teams ask if the GH robot will be at the Cowtown Throwdown. Cerner has asked us to bring it, so yes, it will be there.

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

That is pretty much amazing.

Even given the fact that I'm pretty much in awe of anyone who can play Guitar Hero well, as I'm positively terrible at it...

...still amazing!

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

TITAN continues to get opportunities to promote FIRST Robotics in our area. On Oct. 8th he was invited to perform for the Cerner Corporation Town Hall event at Kemper Arena in Kansas City. He was the pre-show entertainment for an audience of over 2,000. We had him challenge a couple of guitar-hero-ace Cerner associates to face-offs for the crowd, and he was a big hit (beat them both!).

Here's some video from the event: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zUEVzjbzjD4

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

A broadcast journalism student at our school produced the following news story as a feature for our school TV channel. It gives a little more information about the making of the GH robot, and lets you meet the student who programmed him.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CYWwQ7JRHbY

The original videos of the robot are here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VLQhX0nZV6I
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0mWHVvKb1hM

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

Holy cow, this is awesome. Can't believe I didn't find this on CD before now. I would REALLY like the chance to see this in person. Any chance you will bring it to Atlanta?

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

In response to past and recent requests about if the GH robot will be appearing at events......he will be at the North Star Regional (upper concourse). As to whether he will be at Atlanta, that depends on what happens at North Star!

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

The head looks to be a Dell Studio 1737...am I right?

Also, has it paid itself off yet?

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

Dell 1735.

Not yet. Not sure he ever will, but we look at him as a worthwhile investment. He is a great ambassador for our team and FIRST.

Re: Team 1986 introduces our new Guitar Hero Robot
 

I saw this thing playing at the North Star Regional this weekend. It was incredible! Totally stomping human players :D