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6 Common Sensing Techniques for Reactive Robots
mad 200 to reflexively track a soccer ball to compare what would happen if the robot
had some concept of object permanence. Because of the angle of the camera, the ro-
bot would lose sight of the ball when it was almost touching it. The behaviors that
emerged worked, but always generated much laughter. The robot would see the ball
and accelerate rapidly to its estimated location to “kick” it. When it got to the ball, it
suddenly deccelerated but had enough momentum to bump the ball. The ball would
slowly roll forward, back into the now-stationary robot’s field of view. The robot
would again jump forward, and the cycle would repeat endlessly.

Photographs and scanning.
Dale Hawkins, Mark Micire, Brian Minten, Mark Powell, and Jake Sprouse helped
photograph robots, sensors, and demonstrations of perceptual behaviors.