Robotics, Transhumanism, Mind Control
This Rocking Lead Singer is a 3D Hologram
October 20, 2010Singularity Hub - The internet is such a big place that sometimes I stumble onto huge trends that I’ve never even heard of before. Case in point: Hatsune Miku. She’s a Japanese pop diva who’s just started to play massive stadium concerts to sold out crowds. Her hair is blue, she dresses like Sailor Moon, and she’ll only appear in concerts via a 3D ‘hologram’.
Oh, and did I forget to mention that she’s completely fictional? Created by Crypton Future Media, Hatsune Miku is a virtual singing avatar that you can purchase for your PC and program to play any song you create. She and her virtual colleagues have gone on limited tours in Japan and virtual avatar song writing is a growing trend all over the world. Surprising? Perhaps, but the thing that really blows me away is that I actually like her songs. Check out Hatsune Miku’s performance of Stargazer in the video below. Not bad for JPop.
Watching Miku sing live is pretty amazing. The 3D ‘hologram’ isn’t that impressive, it looks to be a modern version of the pepper’s ghost illusion we’ve seen before, but the crowd reaction is intense. I’ve been to concerts where the band’s fan base was considerably less enthusiastic. How must it feel to be a musician and see this virtual character getting way more love than you? Hatsune Miku and her ‘friends’ may only have played a few tours, but there’s little doubt that these guys are rock stars:
In order to create a character that sounds believably human, Crypton uses a real person’s voice as the basis for the avatar’s distinct singing style. The adaptation of someone’s singing voice into a character that a user can program to sing anything has lead to controversy. Real musicians have been loathe to step forward and submit their voices for fear that they’ll be replaced by a virtual copy of themselves. Instead of professional singers, Crypton has hired cartoon voice actors to provide the basis for their avatars. Miku is reportedly created from the voice of Saki Fujita...
Robots and Humans Dancing Together – The World is Getting Weirder
October 19, 2010Singularity Hub - Visitors to the recent Digital Content Expo in Tokyo got to see one of the more unusual performances of their lives: a robotic woman dancing and singing with her human counterparts to a choreographed pop routine. The HRP-4C, a bot made to resemble a typical 19-29 year old Japanese woman, is a product of Kawada and AIST that was released early last year and has been taught how to strut, dance, and sing. HRP-4C has a human-like face that many will find creepy, and her moves are a little stilted on the dance floor. Still, watching the robot perform as part of a real human dance troupe is pretty amazing. Check it out for yourself in the videos below. Her feet don’t come far off the ground, but the HRP-4C is taking a big leap into the world of entertainment.
Kawada’s HRP line of bots is constantly pushing its limits in terms of fluid motion and control. The HRP-4C impressed us with its debut last year, and was one of our Best Robots of 2009. While you’d never mistake one for a real human, the HRP robots all can move with an ease that puts them near the forefront of their field. And they’re actually about the same size of a human (five foot or so), unlike Honda’s ASIMO. That life-like scale really comes in handy when you want to blend into a dance company:
The next video shows the exact same routine, shot from a different angle. Only watch if you’re into choreography and like to see different perspectives on the same dance.
The real story isn’t how smoothly the HRP-4C moves, however, it’s that the robot can interact with humans for entertainment in a way that’s watchable. Although her part is simplified, the HRP-4C is performing real choreography. The routine was created by performer/dancer SAM, a member of the band TRF - a well known name in Japan and abroad. The HRP-4C’s singing voice is produced via Yamaha’s Vocaloid software, which is becoming a new standard for synthetic music, and is used in popular songwriting software the world over. This is real art. A little basic, perhaps, but real art.
As robots improve in quality, we’ll only see more of this blending of machines and humans for performance. Previously, and even now, such dancing displays have been appreciated more for their novelty than their quality. Eventually, however, we’ll have robots that can dance and sing with humans on equal footing. Keep up the good work, HRP-4C, in another decade you could be headlining with robot Beyonce.
World's First Fully Robotic Surgery Performed in Montreal
The surgery marks the first time that a robot surgeon and a robot anesthesiologist have collaborated to operate on a humanOctober 21, 2010
Popular Science - I’m not sure I would trust robots named McSleepy and DaVinci to knock me out and cut me open, but that’s what one brave soul just did, when he had his prostate removed at McGill University Health Centre for the world’s first all-robotic surgery.
DaVinci is a widely used surgical robot that can be controlled by surgeons from remote locations, and McSleepy is, appropriately, an anesthesia bot. The two collaborated for the first time ever in this groundbreaking surgery, performed at Montreal General Hospital. Their surgeon masters kept them closely monitored, of course, but the use of the bots provided for a higher level of precision than would be achievable with humans alone.
The success of this surgery makes it likely that DaVinci and McSleepy will team up again. The researchers plan to test robotic surgery and robotic anesthesia across a variety of surgeries and patients.
No comments:
Post a Comment