[Robotgroup] Armadillocon report-

Mon Aug 14 11:54:29 PDT 2006

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I talked to both Kimm Antell the convention Chair and Charles Siros who
was in charge of programming and both were very pleased with our
presence there. Some of my friends from San Antonio are trying to
organize a Science Fictions convention in San Antonio and wanted to know
if the robot group could come to it, I told them that we could make a
Saturday appearance, if they have one it'll take place in the fall of
2007. The people from Apollo Con talked to us and wanted to know if we
could come to their convention, both Vern and I said Houston is a little
too far. Talked with Tom Davidson about the Apollo Con request and he
suggested if the Apollo Con organizers who worked for NASA could get us
a behind the scenes tour of JSC it might be worth while to make the
trip. I heard that the ArmadilloCon Charity Auction which was run by
Sonia did very well. Also all of you who cut out after the 4:00pm
closing of the Con missed out on a free meal at the County Line.

Tom

Def Egge wrote:
> Thanks for posting the report and the pictures, Vern.
> 
> Thanks to TRG attendees...(wo)manners of our 'booth'...helpers with the
> load-in and load-out: Vern Graner , Eric and Catherine (aka Ana) Lundquist,
> Derek Bridges, Tom Morin, Rick Abbott, Bob and David Comer, and Denise
> Scioli.  Thanks, too, to Tom Davidson, Sonia Santana, and Jeff Hurst for
> taking the time to hang out with us while they attended the 'con.
> 
> It has been too long since TRG attended ArmadilloCon.  I'm planning to
> attend next year (already bought my 3-day pass) and I hope TRG will decide
> to do so again.  We may have picked up a few new members (pre-paid).
> 
> Vern was being modest about the Meet The Robot Group panel.  He presented
> "Automated Fear" to a standing-room only audience after setting up all of
> his equipment (while Eric and Denise spoke of the Robot Group).  Chuck
> Siros was very pleased and impressed.
> 
> I hope that we have a white T-shirt printed up before next summer.  With
> the outside temperatures hovering at or above 100 F in the afternoon, a
> black T-shirt is less than pleasant in the sunlight.
> 
> Thanks, again, to all who helped out.
> 
> 
> All the best....
> 
> Mike
> 
> 
> At 12:06 2006/08/14 -0500, you wrote:
>> Ok, I wanted to throw a bit of info about Armadillocon onto the list.. :)
>>
>> First the pictures:
>>
>> http://www.robotgroup.net/armadillocon28
>>
>> Don't miss Eric's dancing debut with the therepings!
>>
>> :)
>>
>> So, a show summary:
>>
>> The booth was completely setup and running a little after 10:00am. 
>> Denise was nice enough to act as the "Hearse" for B0rkin Bob, (aka the 
>> dungeon keeper) since the coffin wont fit in my car. :)
>>
>> The booth was in a corner of the dealer room and we had some comments 
>>from show organizers that they might place us at the *end* of the hall 
>> next time. Turns our many people came to our booth and stopped right 
>> there, never getting to the back of the room. Our booth was a literal 
>> show-stopper! :)
>>
>> Lots of robo-crew were wandering the halls. Rick manned the eggbot and 
>> Eric made the babbling head babble with the help of the Haunt 
>> Controller's power supply. and drove the Black Knight around a bit.
>>
>> We entertained folks with the Therepings using the Dungeon Keeper as a 
>> PA system and talked to various folks that came by the booth. When it 
>> was time for the "Automating Fear" presentation, we carried the dungeon 
>> keepers coffin across the hall to the presentation room while repeating 
>> the litany "Bring out your Dead!" :)
>>
>> Though it took a bit of time to get all setup, we had a standing room 
>> only crowd and the people laughed and appeared to enjoy the 
>> presentation. I don't know precisely how focused it was on the interests 
>> of the type folks that attend Armadillocon as the presentation focuses 
>> on the types of microprocessors used and software/hardware options.
>>
>> I think folks enjoyed the presentation nonetheless. We only had one 
>> person leave "early" and that was after we had been on for about 45 
>> minutes and someone standing in the back quickly took the empty chair. :)
>>
>> We then adjourned back to the booth and spoke to folks about the 
>> projects we were working on. At the booth we had:
>>
>> XAR (Experimental Arachnid Robot) - Vern
>> RC-40 Bot - Eric
>> Tankbot - Eric
>> Robosapien - Denise
>> Robosapien Dog - Denise
>> S.U.V. (Shy Ultraviolet) - Vern
>> Babbling Head
>> Therepings
>> Haunt Controller board - Vern
>> Eggbot - Rick
>> Dungeon Keeper - Vern
>> Black Knight - Eric
>> Theremin Bot - Bob (on day 2)
>>
>> The table and area surrounding the robot group booth were FILLED with 
>> lots of blinkin lights and babbling bots making for quite a traffic 
>> snarl (hence the reason they would like to move us to the end of the 
>> hall next year). I think we managed to obtain two new robot group 
>> members thanks to the great efforts of Denise. :)
>>
>> We did have one person on day 2 complain about the shrill sounds 
>> emanating from our booth to which Mike replied something to the effect 
>> of "Yes the Therepings can be rather ear-drilling". The person responded 
>> with "No I meant that squeaky sound coming from that silver robot! I 
>> actually kinda like the Therepings". :)
>>
>> Also on day 2, we added a wireless video camera to the Black Knight's 
>> "eyes" and used the video projector to display on the wall what the 
>> black knight was "seeing" as he wandered about. Video Quality wasn't 
>> good enough to use for remote navigation (i.e. Eric sitting in the booth 
>> and using the video feed to drive the bot around) but it was more 
>> entertaining eye-candy for passers-by.
>>
>> All in all, the displays we provided did add to the spectacle and there 
>> really wasn't anything like our booth at the show. Lots of people 
>> enjoyed our presence, especially the kids. However, as I type this, I 
>> was hesitant to describe it as a "success" as I'm not sure *exactly* 
>> what we were there to *accomplish*...? :)
>>
>> It was discussed that we use future opportunities of this nature to 
>> either sell things for fund raising for the group, or as a way to 
>> advertise for new members. I'm going to explore building a presentation 
>> that details the groups history and activities and can be used to 
>> encourage people to join the group.
>>
>> The title we played with was "From concept to concrete - making your 
>> ideas into reality." or something like this... I think Denise and I had 
>> a snappier name during a bit of brainstorming at the booth but I didn't 
>> write it down.. (Denise did you?) :) I'll have it done right after I 
>> finish robospin.. and SUV and uh.. hmm... ;)
>>
>> Anyway, it was a lot of fun and if you didn't come out, you missed out!
>>
>> :)
>>
>> Vern
>>
>> -- 
>> Vern Graner CNE/CNA/SSE    | "If the network is down, then you're
>> Senior Systems Engineer    | obviously incompetent so why are we
>> Texas Information Services | paying you? Of course, if the network
>> http://www.txis.com        | is up, then we obviously don't need
>> Austin Office 512 328-8947 | you, so why are we paying you?" ©VLG
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