- Hey guys this is Austin.
Today we're here in San Francisco at Anki's HQ
for the launch of the brand new Vector robot.
So when Anki reached out and wanted to sponsor a video
on Vector I had to think about it a little bit differently.
This is not something that we normally take a look at
but after spending an afternoon with it this is legitimately
one of the coolest robots I've ever tried.
(laughs) He's so excited right now.
Vector is a home robot that's always on.
That's very different than their other products
like Cozmo.
The idea is that Vector can be totally self sufficient
without you ever needing to charge him manually.
Hey Vector my name is Austin.
He's like staring at me intensely trying to remember.
- [Vector] (tone beeps) Austin.
- I feel like I just made a friend.
I love the animations.
He's constantly moving being so excited.
It feels really like it's alive.
That's so cool.
Hey Vector.
(tones beep)
Do a fist bump.
(tones beep)
Yeah.
(laughs) He's so excited.
There's more to Vector than just doing cool tricks though.
There's some real utility as well.
Using his Wifi connection and quad microphone array
you can ask him questions like a digital assistant.
So he's always trying to build a map of his environment
even when he's not necessarily doing anything.
He's just building it? - He'll go through different
modes, so sometimes he wants to play and hang out
and he'll be showing, looking at you.
- So the light green is what it thinks is okay.
And the dark green is what he's already driven over
and knows it's fine.
I feel like he's constantly trying to be
entertaining or explore or do something.
I actually it really feels like something alive.
It's so cool and I think something that's convincing here
just staring at him for a few minutes.
All the little motions.
He's not just sitting there, it doesn't feel robotic
he's adjusting himself, his eyes are following you.
He's always moving a little bit like a normal person.
No one sits completely still, and he isn't either.
- [Man] That's right, hey Vector.
(tone beeps)
Go to your charger.
(tone beeps)
- Oh look at that.
So precise too.
So the idea here is that while you can play with him all day
and let him run around if you don't do anything
he's gonna charge himself when he gets low on batteries.
So in theory you don't actually ever have to
is there even a power button on him or?
- [Man] There is but you don't have to ever shut him off.
- That's awesome.
He just does not wanna be held right now.
So there are a ton of sensors inside Vector.
Not only are there gonna be sensors that are gonna allow him
to make sure that he doesn't fall off of a table for example
there's also going to be a sensor that can tell how far
he is away from a specific object.
He does have his camera, he has his microphones
and on top of all that you can even pet him on the top.
Which might calm him down a little bit.
So he can actually tell when he's being held
based on the gyroscope and one of the cool things is
because he's always building a map of his environment
when you pick him up he realizes that oh look I'm not
on the table anymore I'm being held.
But if I set him back down he's going to start figuring out
oh look I'm back on a table, I'm going to start scanning
around to figuring out this is okay, this isn't okay.
I don't wanna run over say my finger, right?
You don't do that right?
Inside Vector's powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon
quad-core Processor.
Now that is going to be handling a ton of stuff.
Not only handling all the inputs from the various sensors
but it's even doing some pretty sophisticated
machine learning.
So it can determine where a person is,
what is a person, what isn't a person.
It can even figure out who is the specific person is.
So once you actually introduce yourself to Vector
it will then remember you.
So when you come home and say hey what's up?
It'll freak out and be all excited.
If it wants to listen to me at least.
Yeah you heard me.
To design the over 1,000 different animations Vector can do
Anki uses a custom version of Maya which is typically
used for digital animation.
They've rigged a full Vector inside
and with just a few adjustments to any animation
they can get it to play back on Vector in the real world
which speeds up things massively.
Ah, (laughs) he just rolls up to you like oh
I'm sad. - Yeah (laughs).
- That is so cool.
I'm just so blown away at how quickly
you're able to do this.
I assumed that this is gonna be a ton of work.
You have to work out the eyes, you have to work out
each individual motion, you have to test it.
But you did that in what like it felt like 30 seconds?
- [Woman] Yeah, 30 seconds.
Easy peasy.
- So the Anki Vector will be available on Kickstarter
starting today.
So of course I'll have a link in the description.
This guy's going to run $200 if you do pick it up
on Kickstarter and that is going to also include
early access to the SDK and you're going
to get him a little bit earlier.
Vector is seriously really cool as I gently try to hold him
without upsetting him.
So if you're interested link will be in the description.
He is something seriously different and what I really
appreciate is that not only is he going to be able
to be something fun to play with.
But he's also going to give you some real utility.
(tone beeps)
Isn't that right?