Development of an Anthropomorphic Flutist Robot WF-3RIV
Atsuo Takanishi, M. Maeda · University of Michigan Library Repository · 1998
The purpose of this study is to clarify the mechanism involved in human flute playing from an engineering perspective.The authors developed an Anthropomorphic Flutist Robot WF-3RIV(Waseda Flutist No.3 Refined IV), which reproduces the functions of human organs: a respiratory system, a playing attitude control mechanism, fingers, a mouth, a throat, a tongue, etc. WF-3RIV was able to play Mozart's " Flute Quartets KV 298" accompanied by a MIDI tone generator module.This research is part of the "Humanoid Project" at Waseda University. IntroductionThe "Humanoid Project" was begun at the Humanoid Research Laboratory(HUREL), Advanced Research Center for Science and Engineering, in 1992.In this project, Humanoid, who is an anthropomorphic robot and interacts with humans is being developed for practical uses in the human living environment by the beginning of the 21st century.In order to accomplish this end, basic research is being done on both the configuration and functions of the robot, the authors are doing research on anthropomorphic flutist robots as one of the research themes in the Humanoid Project.When humans play musical instruments, they seem to perform various expressions by a cooperative movement of their organs, however, there has been very little research which observes the mechanism considering the function of human organs to play musical instruments.Therefore, the authors chose flute playing and started to develop the Anthropomorphic Flutist Robot (Fig. 1), which simulates human motion in flute playing.The authors believe that this robot provides an quantitative explanation of human flute playing.This paper includes five sections.Section one presents the Humanoid Project and the purpose of this study ,section two summarizes the Air Beam Parameters and the mechanism that produces sound in the flute, section three explains the basic design for each function of an Anthropomorphic Flutist Robot , and section four describes the realization of musical performance. Human Flute PlayingThis robot is supposed to reproduce human organ functions on flute playing as closely as possible.This section summarizes human flute playing, and the mechanism that produces sound in a flute. Mechanism of Flute Sound ProductionAs the flutist directs the airstream that is shaped by his lips to the hole edge of the embouchure, it causes the resonance of an air column within the tube and produces a flute tone.To summarize flute playing, it consists of the length control of an air column by the opening and shutting of flute keys and conditional control of the airstream.