Creative Cobots: Dr. Merritt Moore

Welcome to the Cobot show, the podcast that breaks down the barriers of industrial automation. My name is Danielle Marlette from Universal Robots and talking with me today is Joe Campbell, longtime veteran of the robot industry and head of marketing for Universal Robots North America. And for this episode we have a very exciting guest. Our guest has achieved what some would say the impossible. A career as a professional ballet dancer and an academic queen, quantum physicist. And recently she has fused the two worlds of dance and tech by performing duets with a Universal Robots Cobot. I am very excited to introduce Dr. Merritt Moore to our podcast. Welcome.

All right, thank you. It's great to be here.

We're definitely looking forward to this conversation. This will be unique. I usually have the pleasure of talking to heavy industrial partners and heavy industrial users and I think this is going to be a fun conversation.

Not so many ballerina visits.

I do not have many ballerinas visit the podcast. No. I think the number one question I have is how did you conceive of this marriage, this blending of an industrial robot and classical dance?

So my background is physics. I studied physics at Harvard and then at Oxford in atomic and laser physics and, but also been a professional ballet dancer. And when I finished my PhD two years ago, constantly I've been torn and felt the pressure that I have to choose science or art, dance or physics. And I think after it now been a decade that I've been pursuing both intensely. And so there was that question of like, but why not? Like, why not both? And also the practicalities of man. Physics takes a lot of time and so does a professional ballet career. I think we need to learn how to merge these definitely day and I need to sleep at some point. So I was also, I'm always intrigued by creativity, like human creativity. And I really feel that the intersection of bringing in this technology and arts can help enhance human creativity. And so I was first at the Harvard Art Lab. They invited me and it was just an exploratory week where I was really looking into kind of like AI machine learning, getting inspiration for new ideas, enhancing the dance art form. I was then at Norwegian National Ballet performing Swan Lake and a friend of a friend was like, oh, I work with robots, we've got a ur. So literally like between shows and after rehearsals and on, I would like rush over there and just start playing around. And what's great about the universal robots is it's so user friendly. Like you literally you can just, like you can just start playing right away. You, you don't need years of expertise or knowledge or, or Literally coding. I mean I know some programming from physics background, but you don't need that. So it was starting to play with movement and then Harvard Art Lab invited me back to for a month and a half to explore it more. And then lockdown happened and I just thought I was like, you know, and for the dance world, I mean it's devastating. But at that point I finished my residency in February and lockdown happened in March. And I was just like, how funny that I was just dancing with a robot.

Wow, perfect timing. Absolutely.

And now this is your only dance partner for.

Now I know. Who knew robot would be my only dance partner for such a long time? Yeah.

Awesome. Well that's incredible. And so now that you're dancing with a robot, can you talk a little bit about how you programmed and how you set up dancing with a robot? Because that's something that we think of. It's very industrial, very machine heavy. You're gonna see them in factories or in shop floors. So how did you take this industrial robot and turn it into a dance partner?

How do you choreograph a 6 axis robotic arm?

So I mean there are a couple, I think projects surrounding the robot, universal robotics. And so one is I was looking at just like choreography and setting, like having preset choreography and then looking at this six jointed robotic arm and, and it just felt like this puzzle. It's like, how do I make the six jointed arm represent a head, a body, two arms and two legs? Like I loved puzzles as a kid so it just really kind of tickled my buttons. Like I loved, I was like, how are we gonna make this do the Michael Jackson dance, huh?

Like it was just like, that's a whole different issue. Yes, it is.

I just like, you know, so there's that aspect of it, but also a curiosity of look. You know, as a dancer, you know, I am interested in like communication. Right. Like so it's research shows that communication is like 90% nonverbal, predominantly body language. And so one thought was. But does body language have to come through a human form? Can it come through another type of form like this six jointed industrial arm? And so it's kind of exploring that and what emotions it evokes in different ways that it reacts and yeah, so part of the choreography is pre choreographed and then at what I find super fascinating as well is working on interactive real time dancing.

Yeah, I think. And there is a lot of technology that's coming to the forefront, mostly for the industrial side. But it is designed to allow the robot to react to external stimuli and not just signals, but external physical behavior, which is exactly what you just described.

Yeah, yeah. And what's great is, like, so when I was at Harvard Art Lab, I was working with Jose Luis Garcia del Castillo Lopez. He's got the longest name ever.

That's a corker.

It is, but he's amazing, so he deserves that long name. And he's at the Graduate School of Design. And so he had created what he calls like Robot X Machina. And it's a computational framework that is developed to communicate with industrial robots in real time. It's like the mix of Rhino, Grasshopper, Unity, Python, all of that. But he's using in a way that doesn't. That's not typically how we control the robots. The robots are designed to be programmed to do the same thing over and over in a factory. But he did like a couple, like few hacks and a little back doors to make it happen. And that's how we were able to. We connected a HTC Vive so those VR. Oh, yeah. Not using the headset, just using the handset. And we connected that and so that we can. It was programmed so that, you know, if I clicked a certain location, the robot would come to that location and so my arm and the robot would meet, or I could do a gesture with my arm on the other side of the room and we would get mapped to the robot and it would do it in real time. And it's all like open source and community driven. And so the next steps will be to connect the framework to machine learning tools and give the robot even more agency, which I'm super excited about, and trying to keep everything safe. Universal robots are the safest.

Yeah, well, that's been, and that's been really the hallmark of our control architecture. And I think it's fascinating because our founders were not hardcore roboticists. Right? They were, they came out of a university, they had better ideas on how robots could be deployed and used. And they, and they, they built the control architecture to suit that, you know, and you're right, the difficult part is to give access to this advanced programming while at the same time keeping the robot safe and easy to use. And I think they've done a fantastic job of putting those layers in place to, to allow this kind of development and then at the same time to be able to take it into a factory and within a, within a day have the robot in production.

Yeah, I, I fully agree. I mean, within a couple. I mean, I just remember, like, the robot arrived, it was plugged in and I would. Had already a dance in the first day. That's perfect. And I mean I'm not, I'm not a roboticist, right. I have physics training but it's, it's different. I mean I was dealing with like single photons. Like.

Yeah, yeah, that's different scale.

So this different scale, this was kind of the first experience with robotics or did you have any previous experience with robots before?

It's, it's my first.

Awesome.

I think I can cross like, I think there's sometimes a fear with robotics if people aren't used to like the machinery. So I've not dealt with robotics but I've been in clean room labs and you know, various, you know, dilution fridges. Like I've dealt with equipment and lab equipment.

You're no stranger to technology, no stranger.

To things that don't have manuals and you're supposed to make things happen. So a robot with a manual is like, that's me singing.

Did you, did you do any. How did you acquire knowledge about the Ur robot? Did you go to our online training academy? Or did you literally just pick it up on the floor?

Just picked it all. Picked it up on the floor. So yeah, I mean the, so when I was at, in Oslo, so the friend of the friend works and I'm going to do a shout out to Hero Futures. So they're this. Well, they designed. We're going to shout them out. They're in Oslo, They're a company with like transdisciplinary team of like robotic engineers and software developers and designers working for Human Machine Future, Human Machine collaboration. And they're working on like creating these artificial social skills for robots. And when I, we met with them, yeah like Aiden gave me like a 15 minute prep talk. He's like, power on program, Waypoint set, done. Go to town, go to town. And then he left. And then I was like, okay. And so it's been super easy. I mean it's probably easier than setting up anything else on your computer, your.

Coffee machine to program it to brew you coffee at 8am in the morning.

Oh my God. It probably, yeah, that's why you don't have one.

You know it's funny that you say that because back in the era when we would go to physical trade shows, one of the things that we like to do, we meet with a lot of press, a lot of trade editors and I love taking an editor for the first time and giving them the teach pendant. And just like you said here, we're going to power on, we're going to teach a point. We're going to teach a waypoint. Teach a waypoint. And we're going to end. And there's your program. It absolutely shocks people. And it's, it's really. It's a fundamental part of how we got in the market is just to show people literally how straightforward it is.

Yeah, I agree. It's like, yeah, everything in comparison is so complicated.

So, you know, I think this is. This is also interesting. Have you gotten a lot of reaction from young women who are interested in maybe crossing over from the arts into the engineering or technical side or back and forth?

Yes, I have. And I also do, you know, I tailor my. This stuff, like on Instagram and stuff to them because I think it's so unfortunate how science and other STEM subjects are taught. It's really like, oh, for you to succeed, you have to, like, sitting in a corner of a library and memorizing a book and then regurgitating out it on exam. So anyone want to raise your hands to do that? God, like, that sounds like the most miserable life. And the unfortunate thing is, like, that is not what STEM is, right? As a job or even as research, like, in the physics lab, it's super fun and collaborative and creative. So I, I mean, a lot of the. When I. When I'm, you know, part of the thought behind these dances, behind selflessly just wanting to have fun, but is. Is putting. Projecting a different image out there, being like, look, you can have fun with robots and be totally a STEM dork, but also be creative and have fun and, like, do you know your TikTok dances? And do, you know, like, this is all. It's fun and games, like. And I think the best research and breakthroughs come from a playful, you know, a playfulness.

So.

Yeah, that is. I like to feed. It's like how my mother would feed me broccoli. She'd say it's like a pile on cheese. And so I like to sneak in the physics.

Yeah, yeah, I have one floret of broccoli and a bucket of cheese. There you go.

I'm like, here's a lot of Bruno Mars and here's a lot of, like, Billie Eilish and some tech.

Yeah, perfect. Absolutely perfect. You know, it's also interesting when I look at the programming you've done with the robot. In the dance, in the industrial world, we always look for efficiency of movement because that's what reduces cycle time and improves the process and, you know, the easy flow programming that you've done. To mimic the dance moves is spot on. If that had a gripper on it and was in an industrial environment, I would say that is good programming. It's nice to see.

Nice. And what I'm excited about is like then the steps beyond this. So like talking with Robotique, I think we're doing a collaboration where I'm using their, their GRRPPER and their co force pilot and to smooth out the movement and to enhance all these things. So it's like you know, each level, each, you know, each time I get familiar with it because I have been like, I'm like, okay, I've done a lot of these dances now, like what's the next step? And then, you know, you add on and so it's fun times.

It is. Well, and I think if you, if. And I like to talk about Robotique, they're one of our oldest and most favored partners. If you see what they're doing with the Force Copilot software, particularly in their sanding applications. Still a robot that's sanding. But what they've done is just simplified the programming and setup so much. What looks so easy for them in a traditional approach would take days and days of tedious programming. And I think it's a real good example of how you can have an intelligent, creative approach to an old school problem and actually improve the results.

I'm excited then.

Yeah, no, if you're, if you're working with robotic that, that will definitely be a lot of fun. Danielle's looking at her list of topics that she wanted to explore with you.

All our fun notes. So moving forward, kind of on the, the next new ideas you mentioned a little bit earlier about, you know, the, the creative aspects between robotics and just creativity in general.

Yeah.

And that human machine interaction. And, and was there something in particular that really drew you to that interaction? Just, just to make those, make that.

Work together on two fronts. So I'm super interested in, I think the connections, the mergence of these two fields will create breakthroughs both in the arts and the tech research side. That's my hope. So in the research side, I view that the dancing will help push past the traditional methods of testing. It's like helping to find those corner cases, those edge cases, those unexpected cases, to find the outlier events, to test for failure and to test and to push the limits of what is already existing and to push the limits of its potential. So looking at new movement and interactions that wouldn't have been tested otherwise because yeah, coming from a physics background, I know a lot of the times we get used to the traditional methods of testing things. And so once we've hit all those checkboxes we're like, okay, we fully have analyzed this. But actually I think when you bring in the arts or different field, you are forced to, you know, push the boundaries and see different interesting and creative ways. So you know, looking at humans weight the balance, like smoothing out the movement, perhaps moving the robot, like I don't know, and also improving its robustness and reliability in the long term. So that's what I think, like know the benefits of bringing like in particular dance and robotics together and having been in both worlds like this fusion, I think the fusion of art and science is, it's not very quite yet. I think whenever people fuse art and science together, it's arts, you know, they use it for arts to help communicate the science. But I think arts can have a much more impactful way of, you know, helping the sciences. And you know, I hope to be like publishing research papers about the science and engineering, but from an arts perspective. So that's part of my dream.

Well, I think it's also interesting if you listen to a lot of the phrases that you just use in a different context, you could sound like a robot development engineer. Right. Because to get more performance, we're always testing the boundaries, we're always trying to smooth out and take out any hint of inefficiency, whether it's in the motors or the cables or the mechanics or the gearboxes. So it's, it really is a lot of parallel, a lot of parallel there. You know, when we talked earlier too, you had asked a little bit about what else is going on in the arts world from the ur perspective and I don't think anybody's that I'm aware of is up at your end of the spectrum. But we do see a lot of use of our robots in the graphics arts. Whether it's two dimensional or three dimensional. Robots are used to build complex art structures and we also see them quite often now in architectural side of life with robots actually trying to assist in building complex architectural models. So I think there's a lot of potential there for crossover.

Yeah, and it's beautiful because these, these structures are a, beautiful in their final product. But also I've seen some of these and it's like, it's beautiful in the way that they're created as well, like the movement behind it. And yeah, for sure there's also the.

Cinematography aspect of it too. We're seeing a lot of cameras mounted on the end of the Arms to make that smooth and fluid movement like you were talking about. And I think bridging the gap between the arts and robotics and technology is really helping the newer generations get interested in STEM and in robotics. That's a big thing too. We're starting to see is that if you're not introduced into robotics or science or technology, starting off, it gets a little scary and it's a little intimidating and there's that barrier of entry that you kind of feel locked in. So it's a really great way to bridge the technology with the creative gap to encourage activity within it, starting at all ages.

Yeah. And that whole idea of having the camera mounted on the robot. One of the next projects is also working with an incredible director in Paris and where they're gonna have the camera mounted on a Ur, but also have the Ur with me dancing and like.

How can I come.

Super.

You are central.

That'll be fantastic. Well, and believe me, the impact, you know, some of it's very obvious, but some of it's. It's going to be subtle and it'll be generational. We have a real problem in manufacturing now. And frankly, the younger generations, whatever label you want to put on them, they don't want to be in the factory. The factory is viewed as. Is not a friendly place and the work is not fulfilling and there's limited creativity and I can't find data to support it. But I've talked to enough plant managers who say once they get a couple collaborative robots installed, they find it's easier to hire because people are drawn to them, they're interested. And I think some of the work that you're doing on the public stage makes a big, big impact long term. The fact that you're. You're willing to get face to face with a robot and execute a very complicated dance side by side, that really tells a big story to the younger generations.

Well, I'm glad. I am glad. It certainly kept me occupied during these lockdowns. I was like, I don't know what I would do without Parish. Nabot, right?

Yeah. We struggled with the name at first, but it's kind of grown on us. So. Yes, that's a. Yeah.

I guess.

It'S because I guess I'm mainly. I know a lot of dancers, so everyone's familiar with Baryshnikov. Although we can go with Robot De Niro. We can go. You know, we've got lots of options. Don't worry.

Plenty of choices for all your next robot projects.

So, Merritt, Merritt, right now you're Hunkered down in London.

Yes.

And when we're all free to travel, which sooner the better. What's next or where next for you?

So immediately right now, so in January, opening up in there's this amazing gallery in Mayfair, central London. She's invited myself and two other artists to Claire and Ben to have our works at the gallery. So going to be using ur robot and working with roboticists in India and great collaborators here in London where we're going to make it interactive. So when people enter the gallery, we have sensors so that the robot knows where they are and we'll direct its movements in that direction and we'll do some performances there. Whether it's virtual or live, it will depend on, you know, we will see. We will see. And then.

Right.

And then after that it's also as I mentioned, like director in Paris, like working with augmented reality and with the robot and it's, and for me it's continually jumping from the art side. So lots of really fun creative projects like possibly at London Coliseum, like all these things. And then also on the research side, you know, working with robotic, working with Jose at Harvard, working with roboticists in India and, and then future future goals if I'm allowed to go. So like dream, dream goal is like I would love to go to the moon, I'd love to go be an astronaut.

So you have it, you, you have a chance, you definitely have a shot at it.

So part of my like yes, I'm having lots of fun with the robot, but also I'm like, I want to gain that expertise and knowledge around robotics because that is the future, whether on earth or on the moon. And so yes, those are my future short term and long term plans.

That is absolutely exciting.

Yes.

So here's a. Now here's a loaded question with a follow up question behind it. Have you spent any time in an automated factory that are aggressively using robots as part of manufacturing?

No.

Well then when we are allowed to travel, I will make the offer that Danielle and I would love to escort you into a high intensity roboticized factory and let you get a feel for what that's like on the other end of the spectrum.

I would love that.

Okay, it's on the list.

Boom.

Great.

Come on vaccine.

Hurry up everybody take a shot. Well, so the last question too is I have to believe that the whole world of ballet just been crushed by the pandemic and the lockdown. What do you see in the future there you see a path for that section of the arts to open back up and start to bring people back in.

Yes. I mean, the arts will always survive. Dance will always survive. I mean, it's part of our nature. Right. Like, there's no way it's just gonna collapse and go away. But I think it's just. It was due a little bit of a revamp. Like, I think it just needed to. What am I trying to say? I'm saying it is definitely gonna still, you know, exist, but it just, you know, it's gonna look a bit different. And I think it was kind of due a little bit of a. Kind of a relook to what its structure was, because I think it was kind of down this rabbit hole and had lost a lot of its creativity and innovation because it was stuck doing things that felt safe.

Interesting.

But now those safe things don't work. So now they're going to be forced to try things that were originally unsafe but now are the only options.

Yeah.

Right. So I think it's going to be a super exciting time for dance and for arts. It's just. Yeah. Because it's forcing people out of that comfort zone of, you know, having to do Swan Lake and Nutcracker over and over and over again, because they know that that's the safe thing. But now they're like, okay, we really have to relook at everything. And. And I think. And part of that is going to be looking at tech for inspiration and. And finding that right balance of keeping that authentic human feel to the art form while bringing inspiration in. So I think a lot of people get excited about wanting to bring art and tech together, but then they lose that kind of human, authentic component, natural component. So I. In my work, I always, you know, I would like to push the boundary, but also I like to keep it simple and natural in everything I do. And so I think it's finding that balance.

Well, I think the. The. I think the energy that you've brought to it is kind of defines what the future's going to look like. And for me, it's really exciting to see. And I just congratulate you for having the foresight to take that big leap. Because it was a big leap.

A little stubborn. Like, there are a couple of book. I was at the beginning, I was like, you guys want to loan me a robot? They're like, are you crazy? I was like, but actually, do you guys want to.

But really, I'd like a robot.

But really, you're like, are you crazy? No. And then I was like, but I think you do.

That's good.

And maybe we'll see some robots on the professional ballet stages, thanks to you. Yeah.

Yeah, that would be fun.

Right?

Late, late, late. 2021.

We know some people.

Well, Merit, I can't thank you enough for spending time with us. This was fantastic. And I'm dead serious about the offer that once the skies open up, Danielle and I are going to take you to a factory and get your perceptions on what's going on on that end of the world.

I would love that. And I am eternally grateful to Universal Robotics because I robots, because, I don't know, I'd be very sad at the moment, still locked in my room. No dance partners, no dance partners, no dancing. Just no creative outlet.

Merritt, if people want to get in touch with you or follow you or get a better understanding of what you're doing, what is the best way to contact you?

I think. Yeah. So LinkedIn, merit more, or Instagram and Twitter physicsonpoint with the e at the end.

Perfect.

Well, great. Well, thank you again for your time today and for removing barriers for women in STEM and creating all of this great content.

Great. Thank you, Joe and Danielle.

Well, for all of our listeners, we have a slew of automation information. So if you aren't already following the Cobot show, you can follow us here on Spotify or on Apple Podcast. And this episode and many others are available on our website@universal-robots.com podcast. If you have any specific questions about what we talked about, you're looking for your next steps in automation or your ballet automation, or you have a suggestion for a future podcast, send us an email@ur.nau-roots.com thank you for listening.