Los Angeles Convention Center, Concourse Foyer
Humans of all ages love stuffed toys. We love their cuteness and softness, and many of us play with and talk with them and listen to their complaints. We like to imagine that they are interactive creatures. Many stories and movies feature stuffed toys as living characters. But, of course, they are really just dolls. They are not able to move and react and share our emotions.
This project proposes a mechanism for stuffed-toy robots (“cuddly robots”) that provide the soft feel of stuffed toys. The soft feel is realized by three innovations:
• A driving mechanism that retains the essence of stuffed toys.
• Driving strings that generate a soft mechanism.
• A force sensor.
These cuddly robots suggest a new medium that can entertain us and give us a sense of merging real life with fantasy worlds. In the future, stuffed toys from our fantasy worlds will live with us and enchant us.
Youhei Yamashita
Tokyo Institute of Technology
Tatsuya Ishikawa
University of Electro-Communications
Hironori Mitake
Tokyo Institute of Technology
Ikumi Susa
Tokyo Institute of Technology
Fumihiro Kato
Tokyo Institute of Technology
Yutaka Takase
Tokyo Institute of Technology
Wataru Seshimo
Tokyo Institute of Technology
Yukinobu Takehana
Tokyo Institute of Technology
Satoru Onohara
Tokyo Institute of Technology
Takahiro Harano
Tokyo Institute of Technology
Shoichi Hasegawa
Tokyo Institute of Technology
Makoto Sato
Tokyo Institute of Technology