By An immediate thing that you will notice in the usual robot when interacting with them is the way their eyes move. For human, eye movement is unique and blinking occurs in correlation with little head movement. Researchers at Disney are putting effort to resolve that by use of unique head movement and eye motion. That gives the robots a more humanlike appearance.
The highly sophisticated robot dressed in a stylish shirt that supports its well-articulated head has been developed at Disney’s Research division by engineers in collaboration with Walt Disney Imagineering. This is a big stride for the robot developers and the Artificial Intelligence (AI) industry at large because even without muscles and skin a human-like robot that can portray human behaviors without raising any suspicion is a step towards achieving a robotic future.
You are unable to control some movements when interacting with other people. During such interactions, some head movements do occur without you even noticing them; the eye could also move aside. When breathing, there are some up and down movement of the head; this was a major challenge for the robot developers. Robots that are developed to interact with humans are coded to focus on the human eye but in most cases, they simply constantly stare at one place, this is a big difference between humans and robots.
Researchers now say they have developed a better approach to resolving the issue; they have been able to advance the behavior and the interactive gaze of the robot. This has been possible by placing a sensor on the chest of the robot which gives it the ability to know when someone wants to engage it. It can turn and look at a person; there are also some minor alterations on the eyes and top of the face that have been advanced to improve its behavior. This alteration includes placing some sensory stimuli that can sense distance sounds or sudden motions. The habitual improvement gives the robot an ability to turn for a moment and gaze at the direction of the sound to try and get its source then turns back to face the person. Eye movements like saccades, have been added to give the robots the humanlike facial movements caused by breathing. Blinking is one of the major features that were missing in other robots; this is now available in this newly developed robot.
One of the biggest wins for the robot developers is giving it the ability to not only sense the movements of the person next to it but also the surrounding environment. The robot has sensors that enable it to react to distance stimuli such as people screaming or children cheering the invention of a humanlike robot in Disneyland. It can accurately portray the subconscious behavioral traits that a normal human being can rarely notice doing but can easily notice when it is not being manifested by others. This is a very important feature, in case you interact with other robots; you will be able to notice that they are missing. For one to be able to differentiate it from a human, these are the features that you should look for. With the current improvements, the robot industry is making huge steps to getting to its target.
Robots are gradually becoming part of human life and based on researchers, robots will be replacing human labor soon. There are many places which are dangerous or have extreme conditions for human beings to work in; this is why the inventions of robots will be a major boost to many sectors of the economy. However, the human brain and oversight will most definitely still be required to control and supervise the robots. As industrialization continues to get to its peak, the invention of more sophisticated robots also continues to skyrocket.
Daily adjustments are therefore a necessity to make robots exhibit human functions because this puts them in good shape to work well with a human without causing unnecessary stigma. Disney is in this case preparing to give their newly upgraded robot a perfect look by placing fake silicone skin which will make it look just like any other regular human being. Despite all the backlogs and difficulties being faced by the industry (fear of robots causing unemployment being one of them), researchers still think that robots are the only thing that will bring humanity to the next level of invention and innovation.
