Tag Archive for 'flying machines'

Helicopter Prodigy! Machine Teaches Itself to Fly!

This is pretty neat, here, kiddies.

Toy helicopters are pretty fun, right? Of course. Still, they are one of the more difficult things to maneuver because they require constant input from the pilot to keep it steady. Well, I was over at LiveScience and found an article about some dudes over at Stanford (Andrew Ng, a Stanford University professor directing the research of graduate students Pieter Abbeel, Adam Coates, Timothy Hunter and Morgan Quigley) are creating software that allows a helicopter to learn difficult maneuvers that only a pilot can do by watching other helicopters perform them.

Thats right, these helicopters have real human eyes!

No no… of course they don’t have eyes. They just record the actions of pilots, and can reproduce those actions on their own. It is the first step to creating machines that can go places too dangerous for humans to go. Neat!

Here’s a video of the helicopter doing sweet tricks:

And here’s a link to a video where they explain what the project is about:

Learning Helicopter.

Sorry, I can’t embed that one. Its “protected”.

Take to the skies, SuperForesters!

Orville Wright: Flying Machine Patent 3/23/1901

Good Morning All,

Just found this over at Google Patents, which until a few minutes ago, we weren’t aware even existed.

These ten black and white pages represent the second time the Wright brothers had attempted to patent their designs for a flying machine. Their first attempt was rejected as they had written it themselves. For the second try, they hired a patent attorney.

These simple schematics and descriptions represent the seed from which the modern world has grown. One could argue that it was the steam engine, or the assembly line, but for us, the Wright Flyer remains the benchmark. The jumping off point.

After all, one can trace a direct line from Orville and Wilbur’s workshop to us typing these words right now. From flying machines, to modern aircraft, to spacecraft, to satellites, to us here at SuperForest.

Behold:










Gorgeous.

Have a wonderful and inspired day, as you never know where it may take you.

Love to All,

Team SuperForest

Helicopter Museum Online

Morning All,

The other day we were searching for pictures of the Bell helicopter, we found this great site called helicoptermuseum.co.uk.

They’ve got some great pictures of cool and rare choppers. Certainly worth a look.

Looky:

Wow! Check ‘em out, they got lots of lovelies.

Helicopter Museum

Utopian Flying Machines

This gorgeous image is a footnote to the “Utopia” entry on wikipedia.

Stephane Rousson’s Pedal-Powered Flying Machine!



Stephane Rousson
is a Frenchman who dearly loves being airborne.
The pilot and adventurer is going to attempt an English Channel crossing in a pedal-powered dirigible. While the human angle fascinates me, I’m really gaga over the flying machine.

Check it:

As material sciences advance, and we are able to build lighter and stronger structures, and motors and power supplies similarly shrink in mass and increase in power, there’s no reason a new wave of commercially available, human-powered dirigibles couldn’t be offered. And what fun that would be!

Here’s to the skies!