MotionFlow: Time-axis-based Multiple Robots Expressive Motion Programming

Abstract

Robots have been gradually weaving into the fabric of many areas, including children's education and new media arts. Such combination promotes children's creativity and provides new artistic expression paradigms for artists. However, for robot systems that contain many degrees of freedom, the motion programming can be very complicated. This paper presents a time-axis-based computer aided design tool for multiple robots expressive motion programming, MotionFlow. It allows users who have no prior coding experience to easily add and edit motion clips modules on the time axis. In the meanwhile, it provides a rendered animation preview of the robots' motions, which enables users to evaluate the programming result without repeatedly testing the program on the hardware. In this way, users can perform rapid optimization and adjustment of the motion design. According to the user study, MotionFlow is very easy to use and very efficient for motion editing. It can greatly lower the threshold of multiple robots motion programming and allows users to focus more on creative work.