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Boston Dynamics robot Atlas goes hands on [video]
- billconan 2y agodo they really have this kind of jobs of moving parts from one shelf to another in a real factory? I think a more impressive demo would be last-mile package delivery, since it can climb stairs and operate elevators.
- enragedcacti 2y agoYes they definitely do, see very similar numbered organizers in the background of this video [1]. In auto mfg they need to reliably build dozens of configurations on one line while maintaining impeccable part tracking for auditing and triage purposes. Each shelf on the left could be a different version of the engine cover for a different trim and the shelf on the right will be brought to a station where workers will pick from it based on the number the computer tells them for the exact vehicle in front of them. This helps make sure the customer gets what they purchased and helps for QC and recalls. If one batch is bad then this system allows them to pinpoint down to the exact VINs that were affected. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T8Jlod53BCU&t=60s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T8Jlod53BCU&t=60s
- dyauspitr 2y agoThis is a job that currently employs a massive number of humans in Amazon warehouses. When you order a product on Amazon, they currently have autonomous robots that bring in entire shelves of that product up to a person standing at a counter, who picks the product from the shelf, puts it into a box and sends it off for shipping. This could take all those jobs away.
- Ancalagon 2y agoCool but this is kind of uncanny
- anshumankmr 2y agoAwesome and terrifying
- krunck 2y agoWhile humanoid robots are neat, if not uncanny, I would love to see robots with forms optimized for their work. A large octopus with legs would be ideal for this sort of parts handling job.
- slau 2y agoI think the exact point they’re trying to make is that a humanoid robot can pick up one shift exactly where a human left off. No custom robotics, no workplace changes, etc. This is huge for the industry. Smarter Every Day visited a frisbee factory and they had automated a bunch of things. However, every automation point was extremely protected (fenced off) so that a bumbling human couldn’t walk somewhere and get a limb ripped off. If I remember correctly they joked that it was OSHA or something, which it turned out to be.
- ethbr1 2y agoThis ^ The effort required to change a process shouldn't be underestimated. Especially considered that industrial environments are already (a) automated for lowest-hanging fruit things (e.g. moving stuff around at human height) & (b) optimized around human capabilities for the remaining things. Substituting a not-humanlike robot would require reconfiguring a lot of existing automation around it. If you have "like a human, but costs less" that can be plugged into any existing still-human process? You can literally swap them in. Eventually we'll get to hyperoptimized machines, but an easier sales story to say "We automate your existing human processes."
- bamboozled 2y agoI keep hearing this but I just think it’s silly, for basically any factory, it’s trivial to change the configuration of a space so a better suited robot can operate rather than build robots that can fit into human sized spaces. Yes there will be use cases but it just seems like a problem looking for a solution most of the time.
- dartos 2y agoWell, you can buy a very specialized machine for one task, or but a less efficient machine that could handle very many tasks.
- mempko 2y agoCompare this to the human controlled puppets Tesla demonstrated. Tesla made a big show of something Disney could do years ago. While Boston Dynamics is quietly building the real thing and showing us footage of it actually working.
- letmevoteplease 2y agoTesla has footage of Optimus working autonomously. Not bad progress for something that has been under development for two years. https://x.com/Tesla_Optimus/status/1846797392521167223 https://x.com/Tesla_Optimus/status/1846797392521167223
- guerrilla 2y agoCorrection: Tesla says* they have footage of Optimus working autonomously
- kvark 2y agoYou are comparing a live demo with many bots interacting with humans, versus a recording of a single bot in a factory by itself.
- bottlepalm 2y agoThe difference is Disney doesn't have any factories. I'd bet good money Tesla has Optimus doing real work in their factories, at scale, long before anyone else.
- threeseed 2y ago
- meindnoch 2y agoSee, this is a real video. Compare it with the obvious cgi fake that was put out a few months ago by Figure: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sq1QZB5baNw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sq1QZB5baNw I still can't believe how noone has called them out on that one.
- owenpalmer 2y agoHow do you know the figure 1 demo was fake?
- meindnoch 2y agoMotion is the telltale sign. It's too smooth in their video. Real physical mechanisms shake a bit, the actuators have a bit of backlash, the whole structure wobbles a bit when a limb is moved due to torque, etc. The micro-movements are missing from the Figure 01 video, because they are hard to simulate convincingly. Basically, their robot moves like Optimis Prime in a Transformers movie. Unnatural, and un-physical. You might not be able to see it if you don't know what to look for, just like how some people seem unable to notice when that ugly motion interpolation is turned on their TV ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
- owenpalmer 2y agoEither that or it's really impressive engineering.
- wg0 2y agoWell, anything could be fake these days even the Boston Dynamic's video could be fake in this day and age but... I tend to believe both videos probably are not fake. With speech recognition, text to speech AGI and the advancements in machine learning as applied to robotics, it is not impossible for many or any committed enough group of engineers with financial means to make some notable progress on that front. So it is not just skills but money too.
- meindnoch 2y ago
- SirMaster 2y agoBut can it do a backflip?
- Miniminix 2y agoCould it look less like the T800 from Terminator ?
- jamala1 2y agoChinese Unitree's demos are better by now imo. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8dFTc4W8wm0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8dFTc4W8wm0
- hobofan 2y agoWhat? The humanoid robot in the video is walking on the most even surface possible. Boston Dynamics has a more impressive walking video from 11 years ago (obviously restricted by the hardware at the time): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SD6Okylclb8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SD6Okylclb8 Yes, human-looking gait is nice, but it isn't worth anything if it can't translate to real-world settings.
- modeless 2y agoUnitree is catching up to Boston Dynamics in locomotion, but has not surpassed them yet I think. Unitree's real advantage is the much lower cost of their hardware and their ability to mass produce their robots. But IMO manipulation is harder than locomotion, both in hardware and software, and neither company is convincingly ahead there. I think the uncut laundry demo from Physical Intelligence a few days ago is better than anything shown by Unitree or BD for manipulation. https://www.physicalintelligence.company/blog/pi0#:~:text=After%20post%2Dtraining%2C%20the%20robot%20can%20unload%20the%20dryer%2C%20bring%20the%20clothes%20over%20to%20the%20table%2C%20and%20fold%20the%20clothes%20into%20a%20stack.%20The%20video%20is%20uncut%2C%20from%20a%20single%20policy%20operating%20fully%20autonomously https://www.physicalintelligence.company/blog/pi0#:~:text=Af....
- jemmyw 2y agoI don't really want a robot wandering around doing laundry. I think what most people want is a box you dump clothes in and they come out folded, an extra machine next to the dryer. That would be a genuine time saver. I hate scaling Mount Foldmore.
- golol 2y agoWell the robot is that machine....and much more.
- noncoml 2y agoHow is its situational awareness? While walking with its elbow out carousing the item, would it avoid an object that would be out of its view by the time it was about to collide with its extended elbow?
- coldcode 2y agoThe video is impressive, but how does it learn? How long does it take before it can do something new? I realize this is still very much a research project, but I'd love to understand how it works.
- philipwhiuk 2y agoYeah. The robotics is impressive either way but the AI is unclear.
- throwaway314155 2y agoHappy to be corrected, but AI isn't mentioned in the title or video anywhere. What's with the expectation of learning new tasks? All this would be impressive regardless of that.
- zorex 2y ago“Atlas is autonomously moving engine covers between supplier containers and a mobile sequencing dolly, using ML to detect and localize the environment fixtures and individual bin. There are no prescribed or teleoperated movements.“ https://x.com/BostonDynamics/status/1851624026424197434 https://x.com/BostonDynamics/status/1851624026424197434
- 101008 2y agoIn which aspect is this better than a human?* It's slower, energy-wise more expensive (a human with just a sandwich can work for hours), less preciss and error-prone. As a Manager, I would prefer a person that I can blame (corporative and legally) if something goes wrong, that being responsible (legally, mainly!) if this robot makes a huge mistake. * From a business point of view. This is an incredible techinal achievement, I don't want to sound like this is not impressive. But it seems that every new development seems to focus on how they can replace humans or be better at or do things that we usually do.
- nuancebydefault 2y agoFrom a business pov it's obviously better than a human because it does not need to feed its family.
- downboots 2y agoYet
- fragmede 2y agoSelling one product and using the profits from that to create a second product is how businesses work. So if/when Tesla/anybody is selling their humanoid robot and those profits pay for going to feed the NVIDIA supercomputer that they're using to train models to run on robots, and to fund development of robot 2.0, that's exactly where we'll be.
- kyriakos 2y agothe robot can work 24/7 7 days a week, and if you consider paying the human employee at the end of the month and not just providing a sandwich per shift then the energy costs are not that high.
- 101008 2y agoHow much time the robot can work without recharging / maintenance? What's the throughput for the tasks? In the demo it only carried one object and it took it several seconds to move it. A person could do that faster, better, etc. It's real nice, but if you can convince a factory owner to replace people with this you are the best salesman in the world.
- quickthrowman 2y agoOne immediate use I can see for this robot is racking and energizing circuit breakers in electrical switchgear, which is one of the most dangerous things an electrician does. Arc flashes are very bad for humans, robots can be replaced easily. Racking 480V three-phase breakers: https://youtu.be/Rytjdqj_Img https://youtu.be/Rytjdqj_Img
- throwaway313373 2y agoI'm not sure how robot will be better than a stick made of a non-conductive material. Stick is surely simpler and cheaper.
- quickthrowman 2y agoI’m not talking about using hot sticks used for disconnecting and reconnecting live conductors, I’m talking about removing and replacing switchgear breakers for maintenance and testing from energized switchgear. There is a risk of arc flash when you disconnect the bus fingers and also when you reconnect them to the bus, and a robot is easier to replace than a human.
- chollida1 2y agoKind of shows just how far behind Telsa is with their "robot"
- Fricken 2y agoTesla fans are happy just to pretend.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- laichzeit0 2y agoThe BD demos are cool and I’ve been seeing them for probably a decade or more now, but what exactly do these robots do? Besides for cool demos, where are they actually used?
- JKCalhoun 2y agoThey need to become mainstream before they really take off — i.e. affordable.
- wg0 2y agoImpressive. The machine learning application in these domains is the real game changer. PS: Isn't that the Lord of the Lithium, the Guardian of the Tunnels has the robot prototypes that not only serve drinks but do the small talk with full self driving AGI already?
- karussell 2y agoIs the noise coming from the robot? I thought they retired the hydraulics version?
- zorex 2y agoIt’s coming from the high pressure fans located in the chest. Atlas is fully electric.
- the__alchemist 2y agoI think whenever I see humanoid robots like this: What is the battery life? I imagine this will be a critical limitation on these, until further notice.
- drooby 2y agoThe battery life of a human is 6-8 hours. Those pesky humans also want "rights". Takes a long time to make a new human too. So that's the competition.
- exe34 2y agoyou can also swap out batteries for the robots
- fragmede 2y agothis robot has arms and legs and apparently some measure of autonomy now as well. It can change it's own batteries! Which, humans do at least once a day, among tending to other biological needs as well. So the question is what's a useful run time if there's a bank of swappable batteries it can run back to refill from? Even if it had to go and swap batteries every two hours, for a factory robot that wouldn't be insurmountable.
- recursive 2y ago> The battery life of a human is 6-8 hours. So that's the competition. How many naps are you taking? Normal uptime is at least 16 hours. In special circumstances, much more is possible. I'd be amazed if the robots are more than 2. Slightly surprised if they're over 1. It's not exactly comparable.
- criley2 2y agoHumans have an uptime of 16 hours, but generally speaking can only operate professionally for an 8 hour span. The other 8 hours are spent mostly doing personal maintenance and refueling their physical and mental capabilities. Oh, and humans have traditionally banded together to punish those who ask for more than 8 hours a day or 5 days a week, and have even historically gotten very murdery over the subject. Buyer beware!
- lvl155 2y agoStill find it comical that Masayoshi sold it to Hyundai instead of Tesla. BD was the perfect fit for Tesla at the time. Now not so much and I am glad BD isn’t under Tesla umbrella.
- snek_case 2y agoSo in 2013 Google bought Boston Dynamics, then later sold them in 2017. The rumor is that BD didn't play nice with the rest of Google. They wanted to just keep doing whatever they wanted and not be told what to do. I think that if Tesla had bought BD, it may have been more trouble than it's worth. They might have had to fire a lot of the staff, and then I'm not sure what they would have been left with. Tesla is trying to optimize for production cost and mass manufacturing whereas BD doesn't care about cost. It also seems to me like BD hasn't done much in the AI realm. They've focused a lot more on the locomotion and have been using classic robotics techniques.
- modeless 2y agoDid Tesla want to buy BD? Haven't heard that before.
- artninja1988 2y agoWhy does it jump so awkwardly when the part doesn't fit and it has to readjust?
- readyplayernull 2y agoIf (armIsStuck) forceZ = normalForceZ * 5; // don't remove this line!!! Bob found that's enough to release the arm when it gets stuck.
- markisus 2y agoThis sounds about right, having spent my share of time prepping robot systems for big PR and investor demos.
- stevenhuang 2y agoThe cloth receptacle is being compressed like a spring. It seems like when the robot thought the object was put away (or some safety feedback mechanism of receiving too much force feedback activates), it "relaxes" its actuators and goes limp, say. Then the stored force from the spring is released. What we're seeing with the jump is the robot rebalancing itself in order to remain upright.
- BugsJustFindMe 2y ago> The cloth receptacle is being compressed like a spring. ... Then the stored force from the spring is released. Not a chance. The compartments are clearly just hanging there and not under the kind of tension that could cause something like that.
- stevenhuang 2y agoDo you work with servos? I do, and what we see here is exactly what happens when the arm control loop essentially "turns off" because it is not expecting to hold position. In this state it doesn't take much counter force at all to imbalance the system. You're also ignoring the momentum of the arm being pushed back. Then it is the supervisory control loop (balancing the robot) that "over reacts" to maintain current position. It is this active control that is responsible for the jolt we see, not the spring itself.
- Isamu 2y agoInteresting 3 finger hand, one finger pivots from inline with the other two to become a thumb in opposition.
- motohagiography 2y agowhat a relief it will be to be released from doing manual tasks for a living and to be able to finally engage every waking moment in an all against all struggle for power.
- JKCalhoun 2y agoIn the future we'll all get to be "idea men". (And be famous for 15 minutes.)
- bubaumba 2y agohalf of the population has IQ below average. what 'idea' are you talking about? Actually that's getting interesting. For non-physical jobs we already got significant boost from LLMs. Robots will be another wave when they get cheap enough. For robot like on the video $20K price for mechanics looks achievable.
- fracus 2y agoI'm impressed but I'm also surprised to see the robot stop and appear to think. I would have thought the computing and sensors wouldn't take so long to form decisions.
- ndm000 2y agoI wouldn't be surprised if the slowest part of the system is the API call to a legacy warehouse management system that takes several seconds to respond to get the next bin to target.
- firecall 2y agoIt's required to pause and give the parts 20 Seconds to Comply! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y1uR-OFLGCE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y1uR-OFLGCE
- rkagerer 2y agoWell at this rate the dishes will be done sometime next week.
- berkes 2y agoWhereas my current "robot", aka my dishwasher, has them done in 20 mins (or 90 mins eco setting). Specialized automation is there, proven, efficient. It can be improved, sure (easier (un)loading?), but I doubt a generalized, humanoid robot is the best way towards these improvements.
- JKCalhoun 2y agoPretty sure my dishwasher takes a couple hours (maybe always on eco?). I could hand-wash them in 15 minutes though — I would just rather not. I wouldn't really care if the robot was up all night doing dishes as long as they were done in the morning. And, you know, the robot did their work quietly.
- HappMacDonald 2y agoYou're also saving a ton on water usage using the dishwasher vs hand-washing
- Jupe 2y agoHow long before someone can buy a robot to do a manual labor job for them? I mean, buy a robot and send it to some company to do a daily job where the company pays the robot owner for the use of the robot?
- p1esk 2y ago2-3 years
- numpad0 2y ago50 years
- dyauspitr 2y agoThe company is just going to buy the robot directly. Why would they middle man things like that? Alternatively if they just need the robots for shifts, they will rent them out from some central provider.
- snek_case 2y agoI think you would have to start a small business like rent your robot to do housecleaning for your neighbors, that being said housecleaning will probably quickly become way more competitive and you would have to undercut bigger businesses.
- DoctorOetker 2y agoYou ask the same question as a sibling, so I will link you to my reply to it: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42036078 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42036078
- beefnugs 2y agoFunny you mention the only possible future capitalism model where we aren't mostly all dead in a ditch... (companies forced to pay people for using "their" bot) but it will never happen. The companies buy the robots, and just shoot the employees in the head as they leave the robot store as an act of mercy.
- 2y ago
- firecall 2y agoWhy don't they have 360 vision? Why does it need to turn its head or it's torso? Maybe just to make it more humanoid?
- kylebenzle 2y agoI am surprised by how much we have stuck to the human-shaped robot, seems like an octopus or something would be better.
- bagels 2y agoWould that be better accepted by the public or robot buyer?
- rangestransform 2y agoThe entire built environment to date is designed for humans It’s the same reason why companies are throwing money at a self driving car which can coexist with manually driven cars, rather than building roads specifically for autonomy
- dexwiz 2y agoWhy build autonomous roads? Just invest in modern railways at that point.
- rangestransform 2y agoBecause building anything infrastructure related in the US, especially for rail, is a such a Sisyphean task that it might actually be cheaper to just build an autonomous vehicle
- cryptonector 2y agoWhat's that got to do with vision? They could have given it more cameras to avoid having to have a head to turn. That was OP's point.
- numpad0 2y agoAnyone who don't know what manufacturing automation looked like for past decades should go watch those "factory tours" video or two. Then write down what are shared characteristics of manually handled objects in it and what are deltas between those videos and this. There are just way too many fantasies around here. 1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zQeQWGqfFN0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zQeQWGqfFN0 2: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=csifG1AM5d8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=csifG1AM5d8 3: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wg8YYuLLoM0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wg8YYuLLoM0
- bagels 2y agoYou seem to imply that you have an answer to this. What are the shared characteristics of manually handled objects?
- mrtksn 2y agoIIUC, while this type of mass manufacturing is very efficient, it also limits the materials and what the final product can be. Especially in food manufacturing, they need to add certain chemicals in the food ingredients so that the machines can process them and that's what separates the cheap mass produced food from artisan food. A humanoid robot might be able to apply traditional processes and make artisan, additive free products cheap and available. If we end up having practically unlimited energy(which we actually have, just not harnessed fully yet), we can also have small production centers on every corner that produce bespoke products using humanoid robots and traditional tools instead of having centralized and highly specialized and streamlined mass production.
- freeone3000 2y agoWe have re-invented the tamale stand, but with robots.
- idiotsecant 2y agoSomeone is drinking the 'bespoke artisan' koolaid. Food additives are almost entirely about making products more visually appealing or shelf stable. Cellulose to keep cheese from sticking, nitrogen to keep meat from oxidizing, etc. Your 'bespoke artisan' products are mostly improved marketing and improved staging (better lighting, less crowded stores, more personal service, etc)
- seydor 2y agoAt this point i consider these as fun show-off non-products. Boston dyns may be building actual products for the US army, but none of their videos is interesting anymore. It s like watching Hollywood stunts
- Animats 2y agoIt's a nice piece of machinery. Looks like they finally went all-electric and got rid of the hydraulics. The new model is much less bulky. The task it is doing is undemanding. It's just moving things from one set of large slots to another. No need for precision placement, unstructured bin-picking, or object separation. If it could pick up engine covers from the messy pile seen atop one of the racks and slot them into the storage unit, that would be more impressive. It's cool to see this done with a humanoid, but off the shelf industrial robots could do that job. This is the same place where Rethink Robotics got stuck. They could do simple object movements in mostly-structured situations, but so can lots of other simpler approaches. Amazon, despite substantial efforts, still doesn't have full robot picking. About two years ago, Amazon announced their "Sparrow" picking robot. But that seems to be experimental. It's not seen in videos of Amazon warehouses in 2024. Amazon is using the Agility humanoid, but only experimentally.[1] This is how Amazon currently does picking.[2] Racks of product come to the picker on robotic platforms. The picking system projects a light square on the space in the rack from which the picker should take the product. The picker picks the item, waves it under a barcode scanner, and drops it in an outgoing bin. Repeat for 8 hours. The job requires no more than a room-temperature IQ. Machines should think. People should work. Amazon keeps trying to automate that step. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q8IdbodRG14 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q8IdbodRG14 [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wsIjagFEv84 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wsIjagFEv84
- qwertox 2y ago> The task it is doing is undemanding. Have you noticed how in second 13 it rotates the lower body clockwise while the upper body rotates counter-clockwise in order to optimize the movements to archive the goal? All (bipedal/quadrupedal) robots I've seen behave either like an animal or a human, but this one is something else. Imagine the inverse kinematics required to perform such a movement, and how precise even the slight left foot's clockwise rotation is. It does these very uncanny movements multiple times in the video, this video less about moving that thing from here to there than about how it does it. Also the recovery it had when it failed to insert one of the objects.
- sfvisser 2y ago
- osigurdson 2y agoI love how it waits for ~5 seconds after the job is done. It is almost like it is getting rebooted.
- xuhu 2y ago99 covers for oil on the wall, 99 covers for oil, Take one down and pass it around, ... It's probably stopping to finish each verse.
- guerrilla 2y agoI don't know why people are impressed. Robots are hard and this is a big step forward but it's still useless. This is far from being as functional as automotive manufacturing robots or even vacuum cleaners. This is nothing like the goal we're striving for with these things. There's very a long way to go until this does what we want.
- zorex 2y agoWhy not be impressed? The reasons you gave are enough for the majority of people following along. The exciting parts are the steps along the way. Once we have something that is actually usable and integrated into our everyday lives, it will lose its novelty fast.
- guerrilla 2y ago> Why not be impressed? Because it's obviously useless and a regression from the kinds of robots we already have.
- zorex 2y agoSo that means we just stop innovating and not try to go beyond what we already have? This is not regression since this has no effect on the robots we already have, industrial robots are on their own innovation branch. These are prototypes, a glimpse into the future at what's possible with more experimentation and technological progression.
- christkv 2y agoHow long does the battery last on one?
- Tepix 2y agoLooking at the cool non-human movement of the head, the upper torso and the legs i'm wondering if changing the legs so that they are symmetrical, instead of the knees only bending in one direction, is a coming improvement. That way it could walk forward and backward.
- black_13 2y ago[dead]
- vegapulse 2y agoIt's improving so fast, The way it walks are kinda strange with 360 degree turn, but i guess it's more efficient.
- JKCalhoun 2y agoAmazing. They need to rock and sock each other already though.
- oriettaxx 2y agoskin reaction: useless! unfortunately the world is full of sooooo many much smarter slaves to exploit
- weard_beard 2y agoBut can you buy them, not pay them, feed them for pennies, keep them alive forever, work them 24hrs/365days, and never fear they will organize and revolt?
- oriettaxx 2y agoyes, that is the scary part you are right, no doubt, but I just don't see it coming very soon (fortunately), and I do really hope I am right
- bubaumba 2y agoMusk should by them to accelerate Tesla's robots development. Then we may have them on Mars by 2030
- nsonha 2y agoAny one's tried LLM on a bipedal robot? I feel like with Anthropic's Computer Use (LLM trained with visual and controls a mouse), there start to be some overlapping
- nikolay 2y agoThis would cost as much and more as the lifespan costs of a human in Africa. Anyway, the 3-4-second pause is weird.