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[GarethNelson]

First, take an HMD (Head Mounted Display)
Hook up with feed of images from pleo's camera (darn I wish the framerate could be higher )
Then, strap yourself into a BCI (Brain/Computer Interface)

Control pleo's movements through the BCI while seeing through his eyes.

Yes, I do in fact own a simple BCI and an HMD

[barrettgazzy]

hehe sounds like a crazy cool idea 

[gucci_boi7782]

Hmm! Sounds cool! I am at work at 2AM, so I have lots of "crazy" ideas! No if it is 2PM, then I get loopy. I think you should try it out...if so, how's it working?!

[grumpy]

If I remember correctly from Spiderman 2, the trick is to make sure you build in circuitry to make sure that your pleo doesn't use the BCI to control you!!

[GarethNelson]

If I remember correctly from Spiderman 2, the trick is to make sure you build in circuitry to make sure that your pleo doesn't use the BCI to control you!!

lol!

I assure you that it's read-only, basically just a 3-electrode EEG that works by seperating frequency bands. It's rather fun to use when gaming (ever shot someone with thought? It's cooler than it sounds).

[Crewella]

It does sound cool, but it's waaaaaaaaaay over my technonumpty head, I'm afraid!

[RedwoodsMama]

 I am with your Crewella, I am so out of the Computer Techno talk that I feel like I am back in the 1980's when I worked on the first Apple Computers that came out, now that was fun, talk about DINOSAURS!
                                         REDWOODSMAMA AND TEAM NOVA

[GarethNelson]

So far i've managed to wag the pleo's tail, working up to walking it with brain power!

[gucci_boi7782]

COOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOL!!!


In Layman's terms, how exactly is this achievable?

[GarethNelson]

Purchase an OCZ NIA (google it), then use pynia or Triathlon to get usable data from it and pass it to your pleo using PySerial and the "joint move" command.

I used the same Triathlon profile that i've previously used for moving my avatar around on second life, which is configured so that I can turn left or right easily by thinking about moving my eyes left or right.

[InmemoryofRomeo]

If that's layman's terms Gareth, I'd hate to hear the technical terms

Basically Gucci you stick a special device on your head that reads your brainwaves which is translated by the computer into motion in a video game or in this case a robot. Ie you think about turning left and Pleo or your game character turns left etc

[gucci_boi7782]

If that's layman's terms Gareth, I'd hate to hear the technical terms

Basically Gucci you stick a special device on your head that reads your brainwaves which is translated by the computer into motion in a video game or in this case a robot. Ie you think about turning left and Pleo or your game character turns left etc

Agreed...hate to hear the tech side. Gotcha, I think..didn't know those things were possible...ahh technology, I have no flipping idea how it works or what it is!

[Crewella]

Yep, I was glad IMR posted that as well (thanks IMR!)!  I'm not quite as dim as I am blonde, but I get completely lost with 'alphabet tech speak' (BCI, CPU, IMR ( ) etc).  That said, I have nothing but respect for those who do understand it!

[GarethNelson]

Uber layman's terms:
You stick a thing on your head and plug it into a little box (the little box is called the "Neural Impulse Actuator" and is manufactured by a company called OCZ)
You plug the little box into your computer
You plug your pleo into your computer too
You run a special magic program on the computer and think about moving your eyes left or right to move the pleo's tail left or right (Ask me if you want the "special magic program")

Technical terms:
A special headband with carbon nanofibre electrodes is used to pick up EEG signals from your forehead, this is passed into a USB HID (Human Interface Device) that seperates out frequency bands and presents the various amplitudes to software running on the computer which then uses an ANN (Artificial Neural Net) to determine muscle signals going to your eyes and whether you're trying to turn them left or right. It then uses this to increment or decrement a variable while keeping it within the right range for the joint on pleo's tail. On each iteration of the main loop, it'll pass a "joint move 9 $new_pos" command to pleo's monitor if $new_pos has changed from the last loop iteration.

For interfacing with the OCZ NIA I used a project called Triathlon, and for interfacing with the pleo I used PySerial. My own code is a tiny little python script that listens for keyboard input events from triathlon. Next i'm going to try and use a direct interface with the neural net to get more direct control over all pleo's joints.

[Crewella]

Thank you Gareth, I can now say with some certainty that that does indeed sound cool!

[InmemoryofRomeo]

Very cool indeed but I don't think it'd work on my mind, I'm completely scatter brained I'd probably blow it up

[GarethNelson]

Here's what it looks like:

[InmemoryofRomeo]

Not exactly a fashion statement But it looks better than I expected, how responsive do you find it, and do you have trouble (or do you even need to) concentrate?

[GarethNelson]

You do need to concentrate a lot and it takes practice to get used to it (plus you also need to train the computer as well as yourself). But once used to it, it does take a lot more concentration.

One thing to watch out for is if you train the computer while tired, it'll never work for you again unless you're using it when tired, and ditto for if you train while wide awake and try to use while tired.

By the way in that pic i'm also wearing my huge earphones, ignore them.