TALKING WITH ROBOTS

PROF NICK CAMPBELL

This is your opportunity to have a chat with a robot. Developed as part of the FastNet project, an SFI funded initiative, this experiment will allow the visitor to interact with a robot and gain an insight into how a robot might interact with them. The focus of the experiment will be on the non-verbal aspects of conversation to show how humans process a myriad of signals from their gestures and tone of voice— this is something robots are not as good at processing. Using a LEGO NXT (Mindstorms) robot as a platform for cameras and microphones the work will offer the visitor a robot’s-eye-view of a conversation with a human. The conversation data will be captured and used to create a collection of human-robot-interaction, as well as a substantial database of voices and speech from Science Gallery visitors.