Exercise - Moving Like a Robot

For this solo exercise, we will explore how we can learn the movement vocabulary of a robot by pretending to be robots with our own bodies.

Expressive Movement with Robots

One of the hardest parts of using robots in performance is finding expressive movements within the limited freedoms of the robot body. Your body and face have many, many more degrees of freedom than the robot, all of which you unconsiously inhabit each waking minute.

However, the robot is capable of moving with precise timing, so it can achieve expression through rhythmic movement. It can also position its body in relation to other robots and objects in the world. These poses reveal internal narratives and attitudes as the audience interprets the causes of these choices.

Part 1: Movement

  1. First, stand up and move to a small clear area of the floor.
  2. Let go of your preconceptions of ‘doing the robot’ and visualize the body of the robot carefully: it has two wheels so it can rotate in place, move along lines or curves, but it cannot sidestep. It has LEDs which can light up for which you have no analog. It can make quiet, pure, tones but cannot speak. Its sensors are very limited, it can only detect obstacles immediately in front, shadows, temperature, and general body tilt.
  3. Try moving slowly across the floor, limiting yourself to the movements possible with two wheels. In particular, don’t sidestep, and don’t step across any obstacles. Be sure to turn in place and move backwards; these feel slightly unnatural, but are perfectly normal for the robot. Always face in the direction of travel; rather than step diagonally, turn through S-curves.
  4. Practice all these movements on your own until you can reliably simulate the capabilities of the robot body.

Part 2: Rhythm

  1. Choose a simple movement which can be repeated: e.g., two steps forward and one step back, or a forward S-curve to one side followed by a reverse S-curve. Try it slowly at first. Then try it quickly. Now see how it feels to start slowly, accelerate to a fast tempo, then slow back down.
  2. Try moving without rhythm: vary the timing as randomly as you can, keeping to just your chosen movement.
  3. Identify an specific moment without your movement to emphasize, e.g., a change of direction, or a stop or a start. See if you can make that moment staccato or sharp and abrupt. Then see if you can make that moment legato or smoooth and even.

Part 3: Pose and Path

  1. Find a place along a wall or near a large piece of furniture like a desk. Stand next to it and simply face it at a short distance. How does that make your feel? Now try other directions: back to the wall, facing left, facing right, diagonals. What kind of relationship does each convey?
  2. Now move like a robot in relation to the wall or desk: glide directly away from it, along it, or curving gently away.

Discussion

It takes much practice to be able to channel emotion and storytelling intuitively through the body of a puppet or robot. Isolating the elements of movement, rhythm, and pose first will help train these abilities. The next step is to practice telling a simple story or conveying an emotion using these robot gestures.