Custom Exploration Robots
Robots in the Serengeti
National Geographic’s photographers Michael “Nick” Nichols and Nathan Williamson for the past few years have been filming lions in Africa’s Serengeti. Nick and Nathan use a collection of high-tech gear in order to get amazing footage in areas where humans can’t go. Using a robot designed and built by SuperDroid Robots of Fuquay Varina NC, they got inside the pride to study and explore the world of lions. SuperDroid Robots’ robot at first brought about some suspicion and curiosity from the pride but within a matter of days they opened up to the robot and paid it little attention, giving National Geographic the advantage of getting up close and personal with the pride. See the technical details about the robot build below and contact us for a custom robot for your project!
Read the National Geographic Article!News Coverage of the Serengeti Robot
Articles of National Geographic's research project with the lions of the Serengeti are flooding the internet. We could not be more proud here at SuperDroid Robots to have been a part of such an adventure. Building the robot for National Geographic was an honor that shows that the dedication that we give to building robots for our customers hasn't gone unrecognized.
Check out National Geographic's video production, using footage captured by the robot built by SuperDroid Robots.
National Geographic Robot in the Wild
The SuperDroid Robot team in action!
The National Geographic project was one that we were excited about participating in. Working closely with Nathan Williamson on robot design and functionality, the SuperDroid team came up with a robot that worked perfectly for the project. The robot featured our standard LT Tracked Platform. We then added the custom pan and tilt housing to hold two Canon cameras. The pan and tilt system also had a 3rd axis to level the cameras when the robot was on uneven terrain. The robot was operated over a Wi-Fi network, and the images the camera were capturing was controlled remotely. A custom program was written to control the robot from the safety of the truck. The filming effort with the robot took two years. Following the first year, we made some minor changes to the camera pan and tilt so when the lions pressed down on it with their massive paws, the system could handle it.
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Custom Wildlife Robots
This is not the first time SuperDroid Robots has built robots for filming nature. We have also built a robot that looked like a turtle and was used to remotely drive and film wildlife. We equipped the robot with a 27X optical zoom camera on a full 360 pan and tilt system. We have also built countless other custom robots for customers that need custom work. Call us or fill out our custom robot request form for a custom robot.
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