Here, we introduce a few episodes concerning the creation of MURATA GIRL.
In the fall of 2007, a group of interested people gathered to initiate a project to take the MURATA BOY project to the next stage. Our discussions led to some preliminary wheelie experiments that involved maintaining balance upon a single wheel, and we found that by applying the control technologies used in MURATA BOY, we could achieve a unicycle-riding robot.
We had heard that our Corporate Communications Dept. had been receiving numerous requests and questions from people inside and outside the company on the subject of whether we were intending to make a female version of MURATA BOY, or wondering why there was a MURATA BOY but no MURATA GIRL. Since MURATA BOY’s bicycle has become synonymous with his image, we decided that we would create a new female unicycle-riding robot.
We wanted this project to be an opportunity for our young engineers to challenge themselves. There are staff members in our department whose enthusiasm for MURATA BOY led them to join our company, and when it came to new robot development, motivation was very high. It was easy to feel how eager the staff was to do something extraordinary with their skills, something that would make the world sit up and take notice.
We also learned that there were several female employees who had graduated from fine arts universities and had experience in designing, and we decided to ask them to use their female perspective to design this robot. We wanted to handle all aspects of the project, from mechanism development to body design, within the company.
As project leader, I focused on creating an environment that would foster the free exchange of ideas. Whether you are a developer or a designer, it is important to be able to say whatever is on your mind.
The three female employees were initially astonished to receive their first-ever assignment to handle the external design of a new robot. Their first reaction was along the lines of, “What do you mean springing this on us all of a sudden?” (wry laugh) But once they understood the objectives of the project, and after we talked to them about how we ourselves had approached the development of MURATA BOY, they became quite enthusiastic.
We had initially planned to ask the three of them to work together on a single design, but we soon realized that a design is the manifestation of one’s own unique ideas, not something achieved by negotiation. So, although they only had a short period of time to do so, they each worked very hard to come up with their own design and background storyline for the MURATA GIRL character. When an in-company committee formally decided to accept their proposal for the MURATA GIRL design, we were very, very pleased.
We acted on the assumption that we would be able to use the technology that allowed MURATA BOY to keep his left to right balance to control a unicycle wheel in the forward and backward directions. Although we did have some doubts as to how successful we would be, numerous preliminary experiments allowed us to verify that this would work.
The development of the mechanisms went fairly smoothly, but that didn’t lessen the excitement we felt when we attached the body and tested the robot out for the first time. We had succeeded in proving that the unicycle-riding robot we had envisioned was actually possible, and that was very gratifying. We were seeing a robot that the world had never seen before moving right in front of our very eyes, something that made us feel like shouting out, “Look everyone, look!” (laugh)
In our MURATA BOY and MURATA GIRL development projects, we used robots to demonstrate our Murata technologies. This most recent project was one that involved young engineers, and it gave them a chance to experience the fun of monozukuri. We hope to use our robot development projects to demonstrate how fun monozukuri can be to even more people, and it would be interesting to come up with new ideas that could lead to more new members of the MURATA BOY family.
As someone who had been involved in the development of the MURATA BOY unveiled in 2005, my role was to contribute this know-how to the project.
I was in charge of overall control. We used Gyro Sensors to detect slant angle and motors to maintain balance, but as opposed to the MURATA BOY project, when we only had the left-right axis to consider, MURATA GIRL had to maintain balance along the front-back and left-right axes.
We predicted that we would be able to maintain front to back balance by using the same controls we used to maintain MURATA BOY’s left to right balance. What worried us was whether implementing both the front-back and left-right controls would cause the robot to twist and fall. However, by designing the mechanisms to prevent the generation of any twisting force, we succeeded in achieving balance control of the unicycle without experiencing any twisting problems.
Motivation was especially high among first-time project members, and with their ‘let’s do it!’ attitude, things went more smoothly than I had expected. Things also became livelier with the three female designers around, and their design had a feminine roundness that gave the robot a charm that we male employees would undoubtedly have been unable to achieve on our own.
Our happiest moment was when we put the mechanisms and body together and saw the robot move. We had conducted numerous tests with prototypes, but I must admit that we were relieved when our final prototype functioned properly. We knew then that we hadn’t been wrong.
MURATA GIRL is still a little unsteady on her feet, and has a tendency to fall down from time to time. We only have three weeks until the CEATEC 2008 exhibition begins, but we hope to get these problems ironed out by then.
Another goal I have for a little later on is to help MURATA GIRL become capable of turning and pivoting quickly, and moving freely in whatever direction she’d like to go. It would be interesting if she and MURATA BOY could coordinate their movements.
*CEATEC: an international exhibition featuring imaging, information and communications
It was in the fall of 2005, around the time I learned I had been accepted into Murata, that MURATA BOY was unveiled. I had a chance to see MURATA BOY at the CEATEC exhibition, and I remember how impressed I was. I had a vague idea that I’d like to be involved in robot development, and when I entered Murata the next spring, I found I’d been assigned to the very department that had been responsible for developing MURATA BOY! It definitely felt like fate.
When they started accepting applications for the new robot development project, I put mine in immediately, emphasizing that there was no one who wanted to be a part of the project more than I did. When I was accepted, I was so happy that I could feel my heart leaping for joy. (laugh)
I was in charge of software, adding on a variety of software functions day after day, but there were times when things that had been working just fine yesterday would, for some reason, not be working today. I wouldn’t know if it was a problem in the program or something to do with the wiring, and discovering the cause of the problem could be a challenge. But, regardless of any difference in age or the length of our careers, people were willing to listen to your problems and talk things over with you, which made the experience an enjoyable one.
We first hooked MURATA GIRL up to cables to conduct our experiments, but it was an incredible moment when we installed the microcomputers and watched her stand and walk with no cables whatsoever. “We’ve finally come this far!” is what I remember thinking then.
I want MURATA GIRL to be able to move around freely and come to sudden stops – I want to make her capable of moving in ways that allow her to express her tomboyish character.
And even though I’m working in software programming now, in addition to doing research and development in this field, I’d also like to plan and lead a team on a project like the MURATA GIRL development project.
M.N.: I was in charge of mechanisms, and it was a challenge for me to find ways of compactly positioning the control components so as to remain within the limits of the external design image proposed by the designers. But since we were all used to working together, I could talk to the others about any concessions that I couldn’t make, and they would understand, which made the work process itself a comfortable one.
K.K.: I also designed the electronic circuits for MURATA BOY, but what was challenging about this project was how small things had to be. Since this was a female robot, we couldn’t just fit the MURATA BOY circuits into her as they were. We had to divide the circuits to make them smaller, but finding ways to divide the circuits and designing a software system to work with them weren’t easy. MURATA BOY was controlled by a single microcomputer, but for MURATA GIRL, we had to install separate microcomputers for each mechanism to allow for high-speed control.
M.N.: We made the mechanisms after calculating the body size, so, theoretically, there was no reason for us to anticipate any problems, but we did worry whether there would be any conflict or problems when it actually came time to fit the body and mechanisms together.
When we did put them together, they fit together beautifully, and we saw that there was nothing to interfere with the movement of the robot. That was our happiest moment.
K.K.: We put the younger staff in charge of whatever they were interested in doing. This was a valuable opportunity for them to experience the fun of monozukuri, and we wanted them to enjoy themselves thoroughly. If they needed help in areas that they were inexperienced in, the more experienced project team members were there to support them.
M.K.: Our experience in design had mostly been in the field of architecture, and we’d never done any robot designing. Frankly, I never thought we’d be able to do it.
M.H.: The project leader who came to us with the commission was from a different department, and I wasn’t sure whether things would work out. But I do remember thinking that it was a chance to do something different.
Y.K.: Though I didn’t have enough confidence in myself to say, “Yes, I’ll do it!” right away, the project leader continued to encourage us to take part, and I started to feel more interested. I finally came to the conclusion that if I put in the effort now, this could be a very valuable experience for me.
M.K.: We considered MURATA GIRL and MURATA BOY to be a pair of robots, and took the balance between these two robots into consideration. We also wanted to make the new robot cute and appealing, and incorporated the soft image of children that can be seen in the illustrations of Chihiro Iwasaki into our MURATA GIRL concept.
M.H.: To come up with a character that was both feminine and child-like, I visualized my own niece - tomboyish, mischievous, and loveable. We tried to make the design one that would emphasize the child-like character of MURATA GIRL. When we showed our design to the project leader for the first time, he was surprised – “I wasn’t expecting anything more than a rough sketch,” he said.
Y.K.: We wanted MURATA GIRL to be appealing, to be a robot that everyone would want to cheer on. When the official decision to use our proposal was made, we were thrilled – we couldn’t believe that we had actually been chosen.
M.K.: When we saw the first mockup (a full-sized scale model made out of styrofoam), it was taller and more voluminous than MURATA BOY, and we were at a bit of a loss. We wanted her to be as slim as possible, so we asked for some rearrangement of the mechanisms.
M.H.: The team members in charge of mechanisms and building the body were willing to listen to our requests concerning the design and cooperate with our ideas, and we had the body rebuilt numerous times. We are grateful to everyone for listening to what we realize were quite unreasonable demands.
Y.K.: In the past, my work experience had been in a limited sphere with a certain group of people, but participating in this project allowed me to work with a large number of people to achieve a common goal, and I felt a great sense of accomplishment. Many discussions took place between the project team members on our way to the completion of this project, and MURATA GIRL is a robot that we all put a lot into.
MURATA GIRL
