Honda’s humanoid robot ASIMO will make its public debut in Austria at this year’s Ars Electronica Festival. September 2-8, festivalgoers will have the opportunity to experience an extraordinary demonstration of ASIMO’s capabilities. The site of this up-close-and-personal human-robot encounter is Deep Space in the Ars Electronica Center.

ASIMO in Deep Space – A Deep Symphony
“Deep Symphony” is a project developed jointly by researchers and artists at the Ars Electronica Futurelab and Honda’s R&D people. This application enables visitors to interactively explore an audiovisual environment together with ASIMO, a humanoid robot.

Exploratory Focus on Robotics
This project, which seems to be a playful, fun & games approach, is actually based on very serious and important research. Futurelab staffers have been working in the robotics field for years now—most rece ntly concentrating on psychological and social aspects. These efforts have included collaboration with the world’s foremost robotics experts including Hiroshi Ishiguro (JP) of Osaka University, the developer of the Geminoid.

Currently, the focus of research at the Ars Electronica Futurelab is on Honda’s humanoid robot ASIMO. In Linz during the last few weeks, staffers have been working together with Honda engineers on various experiments designed to provide insights into the human acceptance of robots as well as human-robot communication.

via aec.at