Eric Cho // Erik Conrad // Sky Frostenson // Adrian Herbez // Garnet Hertz // Ryan Schoelerman // Margaret Watson // So Yamaoka

Jeff Ridenour   //  #7
Flockcarbot

1.  Make a number of autonomous robots which can behave in a organized intelligible way in a distributed manner,  without centralized control or computation, or even a hierarchical designation (ie leaders & followers)
2.  Make rules for behavior as simple as possible and biologically plausible.  (Simple rules based only on a small perceivable neighborhood etc.)
3.  Make these robots on as cheap a budget as possible (so that as many as possible can be made)

Design 1:

This is the first attempt of a design, somewhat based on Reynold's Flocking as well as Braitenberg vehicles.  Each vehicle will emit two types of light, one a omnidirectional ambient light, and second a headlight.  Four sensors on each corner of the car will be used to find an overall intensity level as well as direction of greatest intensity of each particular light.

The Rules:  (in order of precedence)

1. If head light level is above a high threshold, turn and move away from the greatest intensity of it. ( this will allow for collision avoidance, both in terms of head on collisions, as well as reflections from obstacles)
2.  If ambient light is above a high threshold, turn and move away from the greatest intensity. ( Allow adequate spacing)
3.  If ambient light is below a low threshod, turn and move towards the greatest intensity. (Attracted to center of neighboring vehicles)
4.  Turn away from greatest intensity of  head light and move away from it. (Direction matching is implemented by this)

Finally, by varying the velocity based on how far out of wack the current rule is, a sort of velocity matching should be acheived.

Jeff Ridenour was born 12/10/72 in California, and grew up in Lincoln, Nebraska. While at U.C. Berkeley studying Music and Physics, he had his experiences with computer music, studying with David Wessel at CNMAT. After completing studies at Berkeley, Jeff studied at UC San Diego, receiving a Masters in Contrabass performance. While there, he worked extensively with Miller Puckette, assisting him with teaching a computer music course, as well as learning DSP algorithms and programming external objects in C for Max and Pd. Jeff also studied improvisation with George Lewis and was influenced by his approach to computer music.

Subsequently Jeff received a Heartz traveling scholarship, and studied for three years at the Royal Conservatory in The Hague and received a Second Phase degree at the Institute of Sonology.

Beginning in 2001, Jeff is pursuing a Ph.D. in information and computer science at UC Irvine.

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