The US-American Georgia Institute of Technology, in cooperation with the GRASP Laboratory of the University of Pennsylvania, has developed a system with which small robots can work in swarms to create a work of art based on the artist’s ideas, without the artist asking for specific instructions must take care of every single robot. The research is about the development of possibilities for human-robot-swarm communication.

In In the paper “Interactive Multi-Robot Painting Through Colored Motion Trails”, the scientists present the potential of robot swarms in art. To this end, the researchers have developed robots that can leave traces of paint on a canvas. 20 Pieces of it move across the canvas. Initially, however, they only leave the traces of color virtually; they are projected onto the screen behind the robots via a projector. They are monitored by a motion detection system in order to be able to determine their position on the screen. Later, the mini robots are to be converted so that they leave a real trail of paint.

Brush replacement The robots are used for this Artists as a kind of “active brush”. Instead of feeding the robots with specific individual instructions, the artist simply determines which colors should be applied to which areas of the canvas. The robot swarm then implements this in real time. The desired color nuances are created by mixing the different colors that the individual mini-robots apply.

“The interface between robotics and art has become an active research area in which artists and researchers are creative and combine systematic thinking to push the boundaries of different art forms, “says Dr. María Santos from the Georgia Institute of Technology. “However, the artistic possibilities of multi-robot systems still have to be examined in detail,” she adds, referring to the still somewhat abstract pictures, which are reminiscent of children’s drawings. Because the pictures are still quite rough.

Robot swarms can paint pictures.

(Source: Georgia Institute of Technology)