Comment within the Art and technology of the Robot Combat League by Andrew Terranova

One of the things I was really looking forward to Maker make Bay Area this year was heard in Mark Setrakian talk. As a kid I was a big fan of the watch TV Robot Wars and Battle Bots, which Mark competed. Not to mention all the work cool animatronics and puppets, it is done in movies like Men in Black and Hellboy, two of my favorites.

The last brand created fighting giant robots for the SyFy show, Robot Combat League. It is only after watching RCL I realized that was the trademark and that I had unconsciously followed his work for years. I was really looking forward to meet in person... but I missed his presentation at the Maker Faire!

Fortunately for me (and you), its presentation, within the Art and technology of Robot control against the League, was recorded and is now available for reading. Then sit down, relax and watch as this master of the Robotics and movie magic tells you just how it has developed amazing robots of the RCL.

Mark shares an overview:

His first sketches of inspiration for giant car fighting robotsThe first prototype, Hades, who built to show SyFy executives cool how the show could hydraulic system models in full steel fabrications and innovative Bethe that powers all the actuators of the robot jockeys robotsHow control huge robots with their own bodiesDesigning and modelling 12 single robot chassisTurning models

Mark also responds to questions from the audience on the pyrotechnics of the broadcast, repair bots during the show, and what it felt like to build robots that cost as much as a Lamborghini just to destroy each other.

Check out the video above to see his entire presentation and visit the SyFy Web site for videos of fights, behind images of scenes, episodes and summaries.

Crash of robots and brimstone beat the heck out of the other