Sic-R

About

As a team of eight students, we were tasked with creating an installation for GOGBOT, an annual art festival that encourages wacky and wonderful passion projects. Our goal was to create an experience that makes people aware of their lack of digital privacy. Sic-R is an animatronic that, after receiving a user's email, scrapes the web for publicly available data and speaks it back to them, demonstrating how exposed their information can be.

Challenges & Solutions

No budget from the university or GOGBOT was an issue at first, we took the initiative to find a corporate sponsor. We first reached out to any 3D print filament companies, software companies, and successfully partnered with SEON, a fraud prevention company, who not only provided the necessary funding but also the API crucial for our project's core functionality. This experience taught us to be resourceful and self-reliant in the face of limited institutional support.

Results

This project was a great first experience in the world of robotics and working with pneumatics, with complete creative freedom, my team and I successfully designed and built a working animatronic from scratch. I personally gained hands-on skills in metalwork, welding, and integrating pneumatic systems. A key lesson was the importance of detailed planning; our team's plan was critical to completing the robot on time. Ultimately, we created a unique work of art that was exhibited at a minor festival as well as being our module 4 end project.