Lecture.

5: Soft Robotics/Actuators
Lecture.5: Soft Robotics/Actuators
Lecture.5: Soft Robotics/Actuators
Lecture.5: Soft Robotics/Actuators
Lecture.5: Soft Robotics/Actuators
Lecture.5: Soft Robotics/Actuators
Lecture.6: Introduction to Robotics Kinematics
Lecture.6: Introduction to Robotics Kinematics

Robotics kinematics is the study of the motion of robots without considering the forces that cause the motion. It involves
understanding the positions, velocities, and accelerations of the robot’s parts. There are two main types of kinematics in
robotics:

1.Forward Kinematics: This involves calculating the position and orientation of the robot’s end-effector (like a hand or tool)
based on the given joint parameters (angles or displacements). Essentially, it answers the question: "Where is the end-effector
given the joint angles?"1.

2.Inverse Kinematics: This is the opposite of forward kinematics. It involves determining the joint parameters needed to place
the end-effector at a desired position and orientation. It answers the question: "What joint angles are needed to achieve a
specific end-effector position?"2.

3.Transformations in robotics refer to the mathematical operations used to describe the position and orientation of the robot’s
parts in different coordinate frames. These transformations typically involve:
•Translation: Moving a point or object from one location to another.
•Rotation: Rotating a point or object around an axis.
•Homogeneous Transformation Matrices: Combining translation and rotation into a single matrix operation, which simplifies
the calculations needed to move between different coordinate frames3.
These concepts are fundamental in designing and controlling robotic systems, ensuring that robots can accurately and efficiently
perform tasks.
Lecture.6: Introduction to Robotics Kinematics
Lecture.6: Introduction to Robotics Kinematics
Lecture.6: Introduction to Robotics Kinematics

Understanding robot kinematics and transformations is crucial for several reasons:

1.Precision and Accuracy: Kinematics helps in precisely controlling the position and orientation of a robot’s end-effector. This is
essential for tasks that require high accuracy, such as assembly, surgery, or any operation where exact movements are critical.

2.Path Planning: By understanding kinematics, you can plan the path a robot needs to take to move from one point to another.
This ensures smooth and efficient movements, avoiding obstacles and optimizing the robot’s performance.

3.Control Systems: Kinematics is fundamental in designing control systems for robots. It allows for the development of algorithms
that can control the robot’s joints to achieve desired movements and tasks.

4.Simulation and Testing: Before deploying a robot in a real-world environment, kinematics and transformations are used in
simulations to test and validate the robot’s movements. This helps in identifying and correcting potential issues in a controlled
setting.

5.Interoperability: Robots often need to interact with other systems or robots. Understanding transformations allows for seamless
integration and coordination between different robotic systems, ensuring they can work together effectively.

6.Adaptability: In dynamic environments, robots need to adapt to changes. Kinematics and transformations enable robots to adjust
their movements in real-time, ensuring they can handle unexpected obstacles or changes in their environment.

7.Safety: Accurate kinematic models help in ensuring the safety of both the robot and its surroundings. By predicting and
controlling the robot’s movements, potential collisions or hazardous situations can be avoided.
Lecture.6: Introduction to Robotics Kinematics
Lecture.7: Robotics spatial description and transformation

Description of position and orientation:

• In the study of Robotics, we are constantly concerned with location of objects in the 3d space.
• These objects are the manipulator links the parts and the tools and other objects that are
around the manipulator’s environment

• These objects are described by two main attributes: 1) Position and 2) Orientation.

• In order to describe both the position and the orientation of any body in 3d space, we need to attach a
coordinate system or a frame.

• Then we proceed to describe the position and the orientation of this frame with respect some reference coordinate
system.
Lecture.7: Robotics spatial description and transformation

Descriptions: position, orientation and frames:

Descriptions: is used to specify attributes of various objects with which a manipulation system deals.

Description of Position:
• Once the coordinate system is established, we can locate any point in the universe with a 3 X 1 position vector.
• Because many coordinate systems will be defined in addition to the universal coordinate, the vectors must be tagged
with information identifying which coordinate system they are defined within.
• Superscript indicates the coordinate system to which they are referenced- example
• 𝐀 represents a coordinate system with three mutually orthogonal unit vectors with solid heads.
• P superscript A possesses components of numerical values that indicate the distance along the axes of 𝐀 .
• Each of these distances along an axis can be thought of as a result of projecting a vector onto a corresponding axis.
• P superscript A is represented as a vector and can equivalently be thought of as a position in space or simple a set
of three ordered numbers. Individual elements of a vector are given a subscripts of x, y, and z.
Lecture.7: Robotics spatial description and transformation
Lecture.7: Robotics spatial description and transformation
Description of orientation:
Lecture.7: Robotics spatial description and transformation
Description of orientation :
Lecture.6: Introduction to Robotics Kinematics
Description of orientation :
Lecture.7: Robotics spatial description and transformation
Lecture.7: Robotics spatial description and transformation
Lecture.7: Robotics spatial description and transformation
Lecture.7: Robotics spatial description and transformation
Lecture.7: Robotics spatial description and transformation
Lecture.7: Robotics spatial description and transformation
Rigid Body Transformations

To start with basics of robotics we should first know what is a frame in 2D/3D world. A
frame is nothing but a coordinate axis attached to a body as shown in below figures.
Lecture.7: Robotics spatial description and transformation
Rigid Body Transformations

Now, why do we need to attach a frame to a body or what is the use of these frames?

Well the answer is simple, to locate a object's position and orientation with respect to other.
An example is illustrated in fig 3.

But how are we going to determine position and orientation of the objects using frames?

To answer this question we need to know about 2D/3D Transformations.

Lecture.7: Robotics spatial description and transformation
Rigid Body Transformations

Transformations:
Transformation is simply the change of position and orientation of a frame attached to a
body with respect to a frame attached to another body. Transformations in a planar space is
known as 2D transformation and transformations in a spatial world is known as 3D
transformation
Translation: Change in position
Rotation: Change in orientation
Transformation: Translation + Rotation
2D Transformations:
Let's start with the easy one first, 2D Transformation. We all know that 2D is nothing but a plane
which is parallel to two axes and perpendicular to the third axis
Lecture.7: Robotics spatial description and transformation
Rigid Body Transformations

Now a quick question for you,

Q: Let us say you have a toy car on the floor as shown in fig 5. Now how many variables you
need, to position this car on the floor?
Lecture.7: Robotics spatial description and transformation
Rigid Body Transformations

Now let's see how to determine the position and orientation of a body using frames and 2D
Transformation in a plane using above car example.
Wait-a-minute, from which point are we trying to locate the car or with respect to what..?
For that we have to first attach a fixed frame to the floor. This frame is called the "reference
frame". Also we have to attach a frame to car.
Let us name this reference frame attached to the floor as "world" frame and frame attached
to car as "target" frame.
I will put the world frame in the centre of the floor with X and Y axes parallel to the floor and Z
axis coming out of the plane (Use right hand rule to determine third axis).
Let us assume initially both target frame and world frame are in the same position and
orientation as shown in the fig 6.

Therefore, the position of target frame (car) with respect to the world frame (observation
point) is 0m in X direction and 0m in Y direction (0m,0m). Also the angle of the target frame
with respect to fixed to world frame is 0 degrees. Hence the 2D transformation is as below,
Lecture.7: Robotics spatial description and transformation
Rigid Body Transformations

Now I moved the car to a new position from

the reference frame. Let's say 1m in X direction and
1m in Y direction and I will not disturb the
orientation of the car as shown in the below fig 7.

This transformation is given as below,

Lecture.7: Robotics spatial description and transformation
Rigid Body Transformations
Then I moved the car such that it is 1m far from reference frame along X direction and
0m along Y direction. This time I will rotate the car +45 degrees (use right hand thumb
rule to determine +ve or -ve rotation) with respect to the reference frame. The
position of the car will be as shown in fig 8 and the transformation is as below

Hope you are clear with 2D transformation and frames with above
examples.
Let's get into some real math. Now we will learn how to represent 2D
transform in matrix form.
Before that we need to learn about matrix representation of 2D Rotation.
2D Rotation matrix is a 2X2 matrix. It is given by

Here θ is angle of rotation.

(We will learn more about rotations in 3D Transformations.)
Lecture.7: Robotics spatial description and transformation
Rigid Body Transformations
Now let's build 2D Transformation matrix.
Assume reference frame to be frame A and target frame to be B. Transformation of frame B with respect
to frame A is given as below.
Lecture.6: Introduction to Robotics Kinematics
Description of a frame :

• The information needed to completely specify the whereabouts of the manipulator’s end-effector is both the
position and orientation.
• Any point that will be described in 3D space will be described within a given frame.
• A frame is defined by a set of four vectors giving position and orientation information.
• For example, in Fig 2.2 we see one vector locates the fingertip position and three vectors to describe its orientation.
• Which means that a frame description is a position vector and a rotation matrix.
• Note that a frame is a coordinate system where in addition to the orientation, we give a position vector which locates
Its origin relative to some other embedding frame.
• For example, frame
Lecture.7: Robotics spatial description and transformation
Lecture.7: Robotics spatial description and transformation
Mapping: Changing Descriptions from Frame to Frame :
Lecture.7: Robotics spatial description and transformation
Lecture.7: Robotics spatial description and transformation
Lecture.7: Robotics spatial description and transformation
Lecture.7: Robotics spatial description and transformation
Lecture.7: Robotics spatial description and transformation
Lecture.7: Robotics spatial description and transformation
Lecture.7: Robotics spatial description and transformation
Lecture.7: Robotics spatial description and transformation
Lecture.7: Robotics spatial description and transformation
Lecture.7: Robotics spatial description and transformation
Lecture.7: Robotics spatial description and transformation