Image of the Day: Disney’s turtle-like robot creates huge sand art

Writing your name in the sand with a stick is a thing of the past.

(Image via ETH Zurich)

Disney Research and German tech university ETH Zurich teamed up to create the BeachBot that can create large-scale sand art. 

The autonomous turtle-looking robot is almost 24 inches long and about 16 inches wide and tall and will be deployed on a public beach to wow the crowds with enormous drawings etched into the sand.
 
The robot has three different wheel arrangements and a rake made up of seven individual movable elements actuated by servo motors that are attached to the tail of the robot.
 (Image via ETH Zurich)

The team of mechanical and electrical engineers needed to figure out a way to get BeachBot to draw precise lines and figures so they used a laser scanner and mounted it onto the robot so that the laser can create an active map of the robot’s surroundings.

Software was installed into the robot to transform images into sand art and to control the robot’s movements. 
Watch BeachBot at work.