Raspberry Pi Updates 1980’s Omnibot with AI and Machine Studying

There’s nothing fairly just like the nostalgic rush of traditional robots from the 1980’s. It looks like the world was buzzing with desires of how these futuristic digital beings could be integrating into our society. Now, because of this Raspberry Pi undertaking by Matt from Viam Robotics, we lastly have a brand new use case for one of the vital widespread ‘80s robots, the Tomi Omnibot 2000. This undertaking, dubbed the Omnibot MAIV, updates the traditional robotic utilizing a Pi so as to add new AI-powered options.
The Omnibot MAIV harnesses the ability of a Raspberry Pi which is stuffed with inventive potential. Matt outlines just a few potentialities in his tutorial, however you’ll be able to recreate this undertaking at residence and modify it with new options of your personal. From integrating AI to wi-fi instructions, the sky is the restrict—or perhaps simply the variety of spare GPIO you’ve got for add-ons.
The brand new identify, Ombinot MAIV, stands for Ombinot Modernized with AI and Viam. Matt tried to retain as a lot of the unique {hardware} as potential whereas throwing in as a lot cool new stuff as he might. His Ombinot MAIV creation has a collection of new sensors, can use machine studying to work together with the world round him and may be accessed remotely over a safe connection.
If you wish to construct your personal, you’ll want a little bit of {hardware} together with an previous Ombinot. Matt confirms that you just gained’t want one with a distant management or tray however the higher situation it’s in, the much less work you’ll need to do. He threw in some LEDs for the eyes in addition to a webcam for video enter. Any SBC able to working 64-bit Linux ought to work, on this case, he’s utilizing a Raspberry Pi 4B. Every thing is powered by a 12V battery pack.
The true enjoyable begins whenever you dig into the software program facet of issues. That is the place you’ll be able to actually management Omnibot MAIV with an excessive amount of flexibility. The cool new options are dealt with utilizing Viam Server. You possibly can observe Matt’s tutorial to see find out how to arrange eye controls, motion functionality, in addition to visible enter from the webcam nostril. However don’t let the tutorial restrict you, there are many different cool issues you’ll be able to add by yourself. Matt suggests issues like object and shade detection or navigation.
If you wish to get a more in-depth take a look at this Raspberry Pi undertaking, take a look at the undertaking web page and tutorial put collectively by Matt over on the Viam web site.