As humanoid robots continue to evolve, they are reproducing more sophisticated and more complex facial expressions to some extent. However, humanoid robots have not yet been able to cross the uncanny valley. One of these causes can be attributed to the fact that the robot does not make eye contact with the human being the conversation partner.
Walt Disney Imagineering, a division of Disney’s research, and a research team at the University of Illinois use a humanoid robot that reproduces gaze and head movements. I succeeded.
When a person communicates with a conversation partner, it makes eye contact and conveys emotions other than words to the other person. There is also a part that communicates the intention to the other party through movement. However, since many humanoid robots have no emotions, the eyes do not play this role. In addition, even when speaking with the other person in front of a person’s eyes, the perspective changes in detail, and accordingly, the eyelids suddenly move up and down, and the entire head moves slowly according to the movements of breathing.
The research team also reproduced this appearance and the atmosphere that does not appear in the words. This robot recognizes the other person by a stereo camera mounted on the chest and moves the eyes, eyelids, and head through various sensor inputs to make the emotional distance to the other person as if alive Imitate the feeling of narrowing down.
The reason Disney is researching these humanoids is that it may be possible to introduce more realistic animatronics in theme parks such as Disneyland. In addition, face-to-face tasks such as counter work can be unmanned, or use of robots for conversation partners can be considered as nurses and nursing homes. Related information can be found here .