Robots have a Christmas party at the Czech Technical University

With a playful video, the Faculty of Electrical Engineering shows what it has to offer in the field of robotics

Last week, the Czech Technical University's Faculty of Electrical Engineering sent out their Christmas greetings in a fun, impressive, and unique way. That is, they produced a video that shows robots celebrating the holiday season by having their own Christmas party in the university's empty halls.

The opening scene of the video seems ominous as the audience is initially presented with a dark and empty lecture hall. Then, it immediately becomes playful, showing a robot wearing a small Christmas hat, impatiently looking at the clock in the hall.

The next few shots show robots from all over the university’s grounds making their way (by either crawling, walking, or flying) up to another room. The clock then strikes 20:00 and the doors of the room open up to reveal a Christmas party held by and for the university’s robots.

Demonstrating what the faculty has to offer

With this playful Christmas video, the Faculty of Electrical Engineering seeks to make several points, the first of which is that robotics must not be associated only with work but also fun. Second, it aims to demonstrate what it can offer as the video includes wheeled, crawling, walking, and humanoid robots (such as the famous Pepper robot).

The Czech Technical University further highlights the skills of its staff and students as, towards the end of the video, the camera pans to show that the robots are not autonomous but are being directed by programmers.

The directors of the video, Oliver Beaujard and Nina Zardalishvili, commented on the unique Christmas greeting in a press release, noting: “Directing robots was an interesting experience […] We evaluate this project successfully, our primary goal was to make Christmas feel good, and we hope we succeeded.”