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Chapters

This textbook is organized into 16 chapters covering all 293 concepts from the learning graph.

Chapter Overview

  1. Hardware & Electronics Foundations - Introduces the microcontrollers, displays, and wiring components used throughout the book.
  2. A History of Screen-Based Robot Faces - Traces the commercial history of expressive screen-based robot faces through Anki's Cozmo and Vector, Emotix's Miko, and Blue Frog Robotics' Buddy.
  3. MicroPython Fundamentals I: Syntax, Data & Loops - Covers the MicroPython development environment and core language basics needed before any drawing code is introduced.
  4. MicroPython Fundamentals II: Functions & the FrameBuf Module - Builds on Part I with conditionals, functions and parameters, bitwise operations, and a first look at the FrameBuf module.
  5. Display & Coordinate Systems - Explains how pixels, frame buffers, and coordinate systems work on both the monochrome and color round displays.
  6. Basic Drawing Primitives - Teaches the foundational FrameBuf drawing methods that every more advanced drawing technique in this book builds on.
  7. Ellipse & Polygon Drawing - Introduces the ellipse() and poly() methods used to draw eyes, eyebrows, mouths, and other curved or angular facial features.
  8. A History of MicroPython's FrameBuf Drawing Support - Documents the version history behind the ellipse() and poly() methods just learned, from their 2022 development-branch merge to their first stable release.
  9. Facial Anatomy & Layout Design - Shows how to decompose a robot face into independently parameterized parts and combine them into a single, reusable draw_face() function.
  10. Emotion Theory & the Core Expression Set - Grounds facial expression design in Ekman's emotion research and minimal-feature robot studies, then applies that theory to build the book's core expressions.
  11. Expression Design, Readability & Human-Robot Interaction - Covers advanced expression-design concerns such as intensity, ambiguity, readability at a distance, anthropomorphism, and the uncanny valley.
  12. Animating Expressions: Timing & Motion - Introduces animation loops, blinking, gaze movement, and expression interpolation, along with the timing techniques needed for smooth animation.
  13. Interactive Controls: Inputs & Concurrency - Explains how to read buttons, potentiometers, and rotary encoders, and how dual-core processing and simple state machines let a robot face respond to input.
  14. Building an Expression Menu & Live Controls - Combines state machines and physical inputs into a working expression-selection menu with debounced buttons and rotary-encoder-driven live parameter tuning.
  15. Porting Faces to a Color Display - Adapts monochrome face designs to the 240x240 color round display using the RGB565 color model.
  16. Computational Thinking & Capstone Design - Names the computational-thinking skills used throughout the book and guides students through planning, building, and presenting an original capstone robot face.

How to Use This Textbook

Work through the chapters in order — each chapter's concepts depend only on concepts introduced in the same or an earlier chapter, so skipping ahead may mean missing a prerequisite. Chapters 3-4 (MicroPython fundamentals) and 10-11 (emotion design) are split into two parts each; complete both parts of a pair before moving on.

Note: Each chapter includes a list of concepts covered. Make sure to complete prerequisites before moving to advanced chapters.