Photo Robotoid
A photographic robot with a built in choice-making capability of taking portraits of the audience.
Controlled by a custom software robotic arm, it operates a DSLR camera with mechanical shutter release. Kinnect-operated body and movement identification should allow the user to take a perfectly composed portrait. However, the Robotoid seldom makes ones that we normally consider to be usual. Carefully chosen parameters of the program steering the robot change constantly. It suddenly switches its attention from one object to another, releases the shutter at unexpected moments and concentrates on “less important“ actions and details.
What also makes taken photos very unusual is people's behaviour in front of the camera which is not operated by a person. They are much more natural and less posed. They are naturally driven into a specific game when they act and move in front of the robot, trying to influence its actions.
Przemysław Jasielski, Photo Robotoid, 2016