This project explores how digital technologies create new possibilities that build on traditional techniques within the field of ceramics. Specifically, Flemming Tvede Hansen explores robotics through wire cutting a lump of clay with a UR10 robot-arm, and how he can upscale the power and range, and at the same time, deal with small details and repetition beyond what is possible with his hand.
November 2022
The overall workflow in the experiment follows a recording by a Kinect of my hands’ movements simulating wire cutting through a lump of clay. Kinect is a motion-sensing input device developed by Microsoft originally as a motion controller for gaming that maps depth and can be used to perform real-time gesture recognition. In this case, the recorded movement is reflected as two curves that generate a surface in the 3D software Rhino by the graphical programming interface Grasshopper. An additional curve which oscillates between negative and positive values is applied in the middle and along the surface. The faster I move my hands, the longer is the distance between the oscillation and vice versa.
Finally, the robot arm with an attached wire-cutting tool has executed the cut through a lump of clay according to the applied curve.
