Description
Quadruped Robot is "a micro-ecological installation that moves." Built on an open four-legged mechanical structure, it combines a 3D-printed linkage frame with a miniature ecosystem: the original lightweight mechanical skeleton is kept, and a removable clear plant pod is added at its center so plants, sensors and the robot's moving structure can coexist.
As it moves, the robot can sense temperature, humidity, light and other environmental information, and show the state of its surroundings through lights or data feedback. Rather than hiding its mechanics, it makes the mechanical parts, the plants and the electronics part of the look. It is both a walking quadruped robot and an art-and-technology piece whose functions can keep growing, offered by the author as a gift to speculative design.
The project was not built from scratch: it is a redesign and modification of existing open-source quadruped robots. Its mechanical structure and open design approach draw on projects such as OpenQuadruped, which publish their 3D-printed structures, STL models, hardware documentation, bills of materials and control-related material. A basic robot structure and 3D-printed hardware already exist. Keeping the original locomotion mechanism and control system, the author used Tripo for exterior design and 3D modeling, then made modular changes based on open-source hardware documentation to add plants, environmental sensing and interactive lighting, forming an "AI generation + open-source hardware + 3D printing" design workflow.
How Tripo was used
Tripo turned the robot's exterior concept into an editable 3D model.
- Exterior modeling: Tripo quickly turned the 2D exterior concept into an editable 3D model, used to check the exterior structure and explore 3D printing early on.
- Design workflow: combined with structural material from open-source projects such as OpenQuadruped, it forms an "AI generation + open-source hardware + 3D printing" workflow for designing the exterior while keeping the original locomotion mechanism and control system.
