Anti-Drawing Machine: An Imperfect Robot for Collaborative or Disruptive Drawing

Not all robots need to be perfect or precise when it comes to their function, that’s the idea behind the Anti-Drawing Machine, which ‘assists’ the artist by sensing pen movements, and then manipulating the paper being drawn on.

Its creators — Soonho Kwan, Harsh Kedia, and Akshat Prakash — describe the robot as, “A machine that allows for either a disrupted or collaborative drawing by manipulating the rotation and position of an ordinary paper material. This ‘machine’ exists at that very fine line between disruption and collaboration, trying to be a little bit of both at the same time.”

On the hardware side, the Anti-Drawing Machine is outfitted with a drawing bar that’s driven by a pair of rubber wheels attached to servomotors using A4988 drivers. An Arduino garners writing or motion data using computer vision sensors and instructs the servomotors to take control of the paper underneath a custom laser-cut/CNC-machined wooden enclosure. Check out the video below of the Anti-Drawing Machine prototype to get a better idea of the setup.

The team tested their robot with a myriad of volunteers to gauge their reaction to using an imprecise machine, and the results were surprising- while most made very gestural, or pattern-based artworks, others treated it as a game, attempting to finish their initial creations. There were others who took a different route and began inventing new drawing techniques to produce strokes that would otherwise be impossible without the robot. In the end, everyone who interacted with the robot found it to be an enjoyable experience, whether they were drawing by themselves or through a collaborative effort.