When US and France locked horns in a basketball game at the ongoing Tokyo Olympics, fans were treated to a tall black robot shooting the hoops with unmatched precision and accuracy during the half-time interval.?
The humanoid basketball shooting robot at Tokyo Olympics was exceptionally good, even if it was just for half-time entertainment.
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The six-foot, ten-inch tall robot completely awestruck the crowd by first scoring a free throw, then a three-pointer throw and then it moved to the midcourt to sink a half-court throw with immense flair.
The robot is dubbed CUE 3 (the number referring to the third version of this robot) and it¡¯s actually developed by the Japanese automobile manufacturer, Toyota.
According to Toyota¡¯s blog, the robot was developed by engineers of Toyota as a free-time project by nine volunteers from the Frontier Research department of the Toyota Central R&D Labs in Japan. The robot was initially a challenge for engineers who had no prior experience in AI to demonstrate machine learning through human-like intelligence. This gave birth to the idea of a robot that could use AI to calculate the distance of a free throw to a basketball hoop.
The first iteration of CUE was brought to life in 2018 at an event organized by the Toyota Engineering Society. In its first public attempt, it only managed to make nine successful shots out of 10. Looking at its potential, Toyota execs allowed the team two more years to progress the project full-time.?
Not long after, CUE 2 came into existence when the robot also got around 600-meter long wiring loom along with the pineapple-like resinous skin. The second iteration also allowed it to stand on its own without support along with increased output so that it could shoot basketballs outside the three-point line. This was a crucial development as with more distance between the robot and the hoop, the margin of error would increase too.
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A few months later, Toyota had perfected the CUE in its third iteration (CUE3) and it first revealed this at the half-time show between Alvark Tokyo and Sunrockers Shibuya. CUE 3 was capable of being adjusted for distance and trajectory and could shoot almost anywhere between the three-point line and centre line, and even catch the ball in its left hand.?
Soon after CUE 3¡¯s spectacular display, the Guinness Book of World Records approached the team to try a world record of ¡®Most consecutive basketball free throws by a humanoid robot (assisted)¡¯.
For this, CUE 3 was reprogrammed to allow it to not drop its arm as a part of follow-through movement and instead prepare it for the next shot. The record attempt was stringent -- no one was allowed to make any changes to the CUE 3 or take a single break, so testing the robustness of machinery along with its accuracy was key.?
However, on the day of the performance, CUE 3 shone like the rising sun, successfully making 2,020 baskets in six hours and 35 minutes, at a rate of one shot every 12 seconds, entering its name into the?the Guinness Book of World Records.
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In case you were wondering, it's easy for a robot to throw balls in a basket accurately using its hardware and sensors, it isn¡¯t. Sure, for one shot or two it¡¯s easy, but according to Toyota, doing it consecutively without a single mistake/drop is hard.?
For instance, the trajectory changes depending on the ball¡¯s placement in the robot¡¯s hand. There are also changes in force with each throw. Moreover, it cannot be guaranteed that the supply of power that¡¯s running the motors is constant/ identical, thus it requires for each through to be calculated and thrown individually.
While robots aren't really going to replace humans in basketball, the future surely looks promising.?