I remember dragging my dad to the IIT Bombay’s annual Techfest when I was still in high school back in 1999. It was called Yantriki at that time and had very few events on the list, but none the less, was one of its kind in India. Students building machines, robots, bridges and all kinds of different projects and competing against each other. And today after 13 years, it has grown to be Asia’s largest student technical festival. Students from all over India come pouring in buses, trains, airplanes and cars to be a part of it.

I also got to be a part of it on numerous occasions. In 2003, I was invited to exhibit my BEAM robots. In 2006, I came in 3rd  in the Micromouse competition. 2007 saw me as part of a team representing Thinklabs. And in 2011, I got to represent my lab, Modlab, UPenn. So many cherished memories!

This year, the highlights were as usual: the robot competitions, international exhibits and guest lectures. Willow Garage’s PR2 was flown in last year, while this year they had Aldebaran. In addition, they had the crazy little Quadrotor from Sweden and University of Adelaide’s EDWARD, an amazing dicycle contraption. Well, there were plenty more but these are what caught my eye.

There was such a huge crowd/line outside each event that getting in was a challenge in itself. But I had my good friend, Pradeep to the rescue. Being an IITB alumni, he was able to sneak me in through all of the events :)

This reminds me to pull out a scanned photo of my BEAM robots exhibit at the IIT Techfest back in 2003. It was a privilege to be invited where we we had ISRO on one side and DRDO on the other.

Above you can see (from left to right): A BEAM style Hexapod Walker prototype, Quad Walker, Photovore, Photophob and the Light Tracking Head with its daughter board.

This update comes in really late. But the news is awesome none the less. A project that I was working on for past several months at Modlab, UPenn, got published at IROS 2011 and was picked up my the media in no time.

Wired IEEE Spectrum Gizmodo Tecca Geekosystem NewScientist
The idea was to have robots build robots using binary spray foam. This foam is usually used for insulation but is a great candidate for building rapid robot parts on the fly.

Special thanks to Shai Revzen for the lead and Antonio Macasieb for the support.

Videos of the FoamBot system at work:

Wow. It’s been just a little over 10 years since my first blog post!

I don’t remember when I last won something (quiz/lottery/game), probably never. But a few weeks ago, I happened to win a small prize at the MakeLive show. The question was to identify a pic from the Maker Faire. I partially knew about it but had to confirm it using good ol’ google.

This is the pic:

(Murray the Fish)

The price was: Weller soldering station, Arduino UNO, Arduino Mega and an Arduino motor shield PCB. (which arrived today)

Made my day!!

My BlueHost web server got DDOS’d (didn’t know what that meant until today) and while they work on fixing it, the website loads painfully slow. I hope it gets back to normal soon.

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Update (10 hours later): And we seem to be back in action!

I have been to NYC a few times before, but always missed going to the (much talked about) central park. So today, on a really beautiful day, I made it. It’s a completely different face of the city. It’s Beautiful.

from this

to this

It took me about 2 months to convert an old 1972 Schwinn bike (bought over Craigslist) into its simpler yet ‘hip’ form. It went through several iterations over the next year (no brakes, bullhorn handle bar, black seat) before I settled down on this configuration. New paint, new wheels, recycled handle bar, new grips, new chain, new brake, pedal straps, new tires…well the only thing left of the original bike is the frame :)

Riding a fixie is a completely different experience, you either hate it or love it. I love it.

I made a sketchup model in the memory of my first competition winning remote controlled robot. Its been almost 10 years now!

I saw these robot decals over at Blik and decided I wanted one on my laptop. But the size and price didn’t match my requirements, so I decided to make my own! Here is my version of the same design. I drew it in a CAD software and used CraftRobo to cut it out of a vinyl sticker paper.

The guy on my laptop is yet to find a mate.

Another great illustrators: