Command Your Own Army of Glow-in-the-Dark Dancing Robots

April 8, 2015, 4:00pm

Conductors have orchestras, generals have armies, and dance-obssessed robot enthusiasts have Light Play, a fleet of 3D-printed robots that flash and wiggle in time to your every move. Created by designers Sarah Petkus and Mark Koch, Light Play is the DIY glow-in-the-dark dance move detecting, facial tracking, and eventually even brainwave reading robot army every flashy Bond villain wishes they had.

“Imagine if each delta robot were a blade of grass in a field, and you’re movements were the wind… every hop, skip and wiggle you made would send ripples of complex rolling patterns through the field as a response,” writes Petkus on a blog devoted to the documentation of the 3-year-long project. The duo funded themselves through Kickstarter, trading DIY delta-bot kits for the funds to build the now 84-strong robot army, each of which is powerful enough to carry its own death ray or laser beam (provided they weigh less than a soda can).

Videos by VICE

Last year Petkus and Koch demonstrated the power of a smaller prototype army at Maker Faire 2014, but they have big plans to show the world what their mechanized minions can do, starting with the San Matteo Maker Faire in May. “There is an appalling lack or robot armies in the world today,” says Petkas. “This is an issue we aim to solve.”