Lightning Talk 2: Making Robot Videos

Class 23

April 5, 2023

Charlie’s Conflict of Interest Statement

Dr. Kemp is both an associate professor at Georgia Tech and the chief technology officer (CTO) of Hello Robot Inc. where he works part time. He owns equity in Hello Robot Inc. and is an inventor of Georgia Tech intellectual property (IP) licensed by Hello Robot Inc. Consequently, he receives royalties through Georgia Tech for sales made by Hello Robot Inc. He also benefits from increases in the value of Hello Robot Inc.

Summary: If Hello Robot does well, Charlie does well.

Making Robot Videos is Risky

• What are your intentions?
• Make your intentions clear
• Easy to miscommunicate
• Beware of overpromising

Conceptual?

Demo?

Product Video?

Educational?

Inspirational?

Advertisement?

Real?

Fake?

Audience?

A Pattern of Failure

An exciting robot video!

Amazing media exposure!

High customer expectations

A long wait

A failure to deliver

Dissolution of the company

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Easy to make a robot video that overpromises

• Easy to fool people
• Non-experts
• Things that are simple for people are hard for robots
• We all want to believe!
• Easy to trick yourself
• Desire to impress people
• Investors
• The public
• Investor pressure
• Want to see demand is there
• Rarely understand the technology
• Forget how hard the real world is
• Believe your own press
• Confuse press with sales
• Confuse investment with sales
• We’ll figure it out later!

Image from: https://www.sideshow.com/collectibles/star-wars-r2-d2-deluxe-version-hot-toys-903742

Dirty Secrets of Robot Videos

• How many times did the robot fail to make the video?
• Is the video a single take?
• Is the video sped up?
• Does the video have sound?
• How carefully controlled was the world?
• Was the robot teleoperated?
• How did humans help the robot?
• What works and what is a prototype?
• What level of working: brief demo, long-term deployment?
• Are people in the video real users?
• Are people what they appear to be, such as people with disabilities?

Image from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oKt-Jz_s9DE

My Personal Experience Making Robot Videos for a Product Launch

• Clearly labeled videos from the start
• Posted the code used to control the robot
• Videoed the robot performing significant tasks
• Released full uncut videos of the significant tasks

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Once you post it, you’ll lose control.

But, you can make the truth discoverable.

https://forum.hello-robot.com/t/making-videos-of-stretch-lenses-lights-editors-and-more/54

https://www.bbc.com/news/av/technology-53348681

Q&A