Animatronics

---

EpiFish - A Talking Robotic Fish that Answers Epidemiology Questions

A developer named Brian Kane hacked a Big Mouth Billy Bass to work with Amazon Alexa.  It was ana awesome idea. So, to undertsand how it worked, we did the same.

The goal of EpiFish is to have it respond to epidemiology questions.

This way when IBM approaches the World Health Orgranization (WHO) or Alberta Health Services (AHS) about using Watson, they can respond "We have a talking fish that answers all of our questions".

Phase 1 - Get a Talking Fish with the help of my electronic hacker friend.  

Phase 2 - Get EpiFish answering epidemiology questions.

Parts List:

• Raspberry Pi - Raspberry Pi 3 (Recommended) or Pi 2 Model B (Supported)
• Raspberry Pi Stepper Motor Driver HAT (http://www.robotshop.com/ca/en/dc--stepper-motor-driver-hat-kit-raspberry-pi.html) 
• Microphone and Speakers
• Microphone Speaker USB dongle
• Wireless USB Dongle
• Big Mouth Billy Bass Singing Fish

Information websites:

• https://github.com/alexa/alexa-avs-sample-app
• lifehacker.com/how-to-build-your-own-amazon-echo-with-a-raspberry-pi-1787726931

Commands

• sudo systemctl start/stop AlexaPi 
• ventriloquistd 60 20 > /dev/null 2>&1 & 
• cvlc voice.mp3

---

Other Animatronic Projects 

In the mid 2000s there seems to have been alot of development around kid's robotic toys or similar animatronics. 

Some of the companies that developed products included:

• Gemmy which made items such as Billy Bass, Buck the Trophy Deer, and the Life Size Dancing Pirate Skeleton.
• Hasbro with it's line of Furreal Friends such as the Squawkers McCaw Parrot, Butterscotch Pony, and Blazing Dragon.
• Innvo Labs Pleo the Dinosaur robot.
• SilverLit toys with i-Cybie a robotic dog.
• WowWee with its line of Robosapien toys.
• Teddy Rupxin
• Wisecracking Talking Alf doll

When you search the internet and especially YouTube you can see that alot of these of these toys have been hacked.

The most common seem to be the Hasbro parrots where an entire community has grown around animatronics and then the Amazon Alexa hack of Billy Bass. 

One interesting project is Chicken Props DIT Animatronic Raven - http://www.chickenprops.com/p/raven.html

Using a Amazon Alexa Dot to interface with the Billy Bass - www.cyber-omelette.com/2019/01/billy-bass-alexa.html 

https://www.instructables.com/id/Animate-a-Billy-Bass-Mouth-With-Any-Audio-Source/

Some of the computer devices being used in this include:

• Raspberry Pi (for Alexa)
• Squawker Talker custom board for the Hasbro Parrots (www.audioservocontroller.com) 
• Micro Maestro USB Servo Controller (www.pololu.com/product/1350)
• Amazon Alexa Dot Gen 2

I predict that a new line of more intelligent toys will be released in the coming years.   

Inventory

• Billy Bass (3)
• Billy Bass Jaws (1)
• Buck the Trophy Deer (1)
• Life Size Dancing Pirate Skeleton (1)
• Squawkers McCaw Parrot (5)
• Butterscotch Pony (1)
• Blazing Dragon (1)
• iCybie (2)
• Robosapien (1)
• Robosapien Dinosaur (1)
• Squawker Talker custom board for the Hasbro Parrots (1)
• Micro Maestro USB Servo Controller 6 channel (1)
• Micro Maestro USB Servo Controller 12 channel (1) 
• Amazon Alexa Dot (2)