Implementing Parallel and Independent Movements for a Social Robot's Affective Expressions

The design and playback of natural and believable movements is a challenge for social robots. They have several limitations due to their physical embodiment, and sometimes also with regard to their software. Taking the example of the expression of happiness, we present an approach for implementing parallel and independent movements for a social robot, which does not have a full-fledged animation API. The technique is able to create more complex movement sequences than a typical sequential playback of poses and utterances and thus is better suited for expression of affect and nonverbal behaviors.