Insert Coin semifinalist: cSpring bipedal robot wants to ‘level the playing field’ for university research

Insert Coin semifinalist cSpring bipedal robot wants to 'level the playing field' for university research

Check out this Mac-headed robot. It’s the cSpring Biped Educational Development Kit from the folks at the similarly-named Cognitive Spring team. According to its creators, the ‘bot is an attempt to “level the playing field between universities,” letting students tool around with an affordable bipedal robotics platform. cSpring has 12 servos in all — three per hip, one per knee and two per foot. It’s controlled by the Cognitive Shield, a bit of technology developed by the team in order to help bring the ‘bot to life. Cognitive Spring will be launching crowdfunding campaigns to bring bot of these products to life.

cSpring’s also got a “Kinect-like” camera on-board for sensing its environment, to help users perform what the company’s CEO calls “really easy controls.” Jump in after the break for a couple of videos of an early cSpring model in action, and click the source link below for more information on all of the above.

Check out the full list of Insert Coin: New Challengers semifinalists here — and don’t forget to pick a winner!

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Source: Cognitive Spring

Insert Coin: New Challengers voting is now open — help us pick five finalists!

Last Friday, we announced our semifinalist pics for Engadget’s first-ever Insert Coin: New Challengers competition. We’re incredibly excited about the projects we selected, but had a hard enough time whittling the list down to 10. That’s where you come in. As far as we’re concerned, they’re all winners, but we’ve got presentation time at next month’s Expand conference in San Francisco, and we need your help knocking the list down to five finalists. It’s a diverse array of entrants, including seafaring drones, bipedal robots, 3D scanners, futuristic radiators and more.

Jump in after the break for links to posts about each of the candidates, and when you’re done, please click here to vote on your favorite. Five winners will go on to present their projects at Expand in March, for a chance to win $25,000. You have until next Wednesday, February 27 at the same time (12:30pm PST / 3:30pm EST) to cast your vote!

The Candidates:

1. cSpring: Bipedal Robo

2. Hodu: Physical therapy hardware / software combo

3. Moedls: 3D scanning for smartphones

4. Make a Play: High-tech puppet stage

5. Observos: Environmentally-aware computers

6. Radiator Labs: Personal radiator temperature controller

7. Smart Knob: Keyless door lock

8. smARTPulse: Hackable Bluetooth oximeter

9. Snapzoom: Superzooming for smartphone cameras

10. Ziphius: RC aquatic drone

Now don’t forget to vote!

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Insert Coin: New Challengers semifinalists announced!

As 2012 drew to a close, we asked you creative types to let us in on your forthcoming crowdfunded projects — and boy did you deliver. We’ve spent the past week whittling down the submissions for our first-ever Insert Coin: New Challengers competition, and are pretty excited about the results. As detailed in our announcement post, we’ve chosen 10 semifinalists, who will receive a free trip to Expand next month, along with a $1,000 travel stipend. Better yet, those on the list are in the running to win a total of $25,000, including a $5,000 Reader’s Choice award and $20,000 Grand Prize, along with product reviews on this very site.

Congratulations to all the winners and a big thanks to everyone who entered — paring down the list wasn’t an easy task. We’ll be highlighting each entry further in the week to come, leading up to a Wednesday, February 20th, vote for five finalists. Skip on through after the break to check out the list of semifinalists, and we’ll see you in March!

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Submissions for Expand’s Insert Coin: New Challengers competition now open!

Submissions for Expand's Insert Coin New Challengers competition are now open!

Because you haven’t been living under a rock, by now you know about our big Expand event coming up in San Francisco this March (plus, you’re following us on Twitter and Facebook to be the first to get all the news, right?!). Did you also know about our Insert Coin: New Challengers competition to shine the spotlight on the best new crowdfunded hardware projects out there? You do now!

The best part is, submissions are now open — and that means you can submit your project for a chance to win free tickets to Expand, $1,000 to cover your travel costs, and a total of $25,000 in prize money! No, we’re not kidding: all this could be yours.

Read on to find out more!

Continue reading Submissions for Expand’s Insert Coin: New Challengers competition now open!

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