Animatronics Hand

• Atanas Delevski
• Thomas Szklarzewski
• Vitaliy Popovych

In cinematography, often times there are scenes which are tricky to film. Whether it be dangerous situations, inaccessible locations, or an exaggerated portrayal of human actions, there come times when the actors are simply not capable. If the production company has enough money, they can turn to very highly specialized and custom-made robotic equipment to counter this issue.The problem is that Amateur cinematographers do not have many affordable options and are therefore limited. We propose an animatronics hand which will replicate human hand movement. It will be affordable, portable, and reliable. The product will feature a one-size-fits-all input-glove, and a robotic hand powered by a battery pack. Flex sensors mounted on the glove will send movement data to an arduino, which will in turn control servos powering the robotic hand’s fingers. Our hand will cost no more than $300 in order to provide an affordable solution for amateur cinematographers. It will be portable enough to be easily carried in a backpack, and will be reliable enough to not need any maintenance-work/adjusting/setting-up in order to use. Finally, our product will provide realistic human-movement in real-time. Our ultimate objective is to provide an improvement to movies made on a budget.Due to our time and financial constraints, we have only been able implement semi-realistic movement. All five fingers of our hand move with three degrees of freedom; one for each knuckle. However, we were not able to implement the side-to-side thumb movement, or any wrist movement. After thorough research and testing, we realized we would need more time for incorporating these features in our product.