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# Loupe

Loupe

## Sitemaps

- [XML Sitemap](https://loupe.team/sitemap.xml): Contains all public & indexable URLs for this website.

## Pages

- [Home](https://loupe.team/) - Revolutionizing Industrial Automation Loupe is a workshop company. We bring together diverse disciplines to workshop ideas in a space that is made for tinkering and storytelling. Each project is unique and new to us, and that variety and cross-pollination fuel the pursuits that follow. We do revolutionary automation work - the creative, exploratory, high-stakes, high-impact
- [Deep Dive](https://loupe.team/deep-dive/) - Is your codebase holding you back? You know something's off. Systems are sluggish. Growth feels out of reach. You're stuck in defense mode instead of charging forward, and you can't afford to waste any more time on inefficiency. And it's no wonder: Legacy systems, technical debt, and scaling challenges can stop progress in its tracks.
- [Proof of Concept](https://loupe.team/proof-of-concept/) - Is your big idea ready for the real world? You've got an idea that could change the game. A new product, a more efficient process, a smarter way to work. But is it viable? Can it scale? Innovation moves fast, and the companies that lead are the ones who test, iterate, and refine before making
- [Case Studies](https://loupe.team/case-studies/)
- [Stories](https://loupe.team/stories/) - Read more about Loupe: our revolutionary methodology, our real-world collaborations, and inspiring possibilities in technology.
- [Accessibility Statement](https://loupe.team/accessibility-statement/) - Accessibility Statement Accessibility Statement for Loupe Loupe is committed to ensuring digital accessibility for people with disabilities. We are continually improving the user experience for everyone, and applying the relevant accessibility standards. Measures to support accessibility Loupe takes the following measures to ensure accessibility of Loupe's websites (loupe.team, shipinsix.team, widget.loupe.team, labs.loupe.team, and people.loupe.team): Employ formal
- [Cookie Policy](https://loupe.team/cookie-policy/) - Cookie Policy Please wait while the policy is loaded. If it does not load, please click here.
- [Privacy Policy](https://loupe.team/privacy-policy/) - Privacy Policy Please wait while the policy is loaded. If it does not load, please click here.
- [Newsletter](https://loupe.team/newsletter/) - Take a deeper dive with Loupe I/O Curious for more? Our newsletter covers what we're wrenching on, what technology has recently inspired us, and occasional musings on our methodology.
- [Media](https://loupe.team/media/) - From new industry technology to machine test drives in action, explore and discover the latest with Loupe team.

## Members

- [Jonathan McClain](https://loupe.team/member/jonathan-mcclain/)
- [David Nichols](https://loupe.team/member/david-nichols/) - CEO, CO-FOUNDER
- [Andrew Musser](https://loupe.team/member/andrew-musser/)
- [Lawrence Sullivan](https://loupe.team/member/lawrence-sullivan/)
- [Scott Claiborne](https://loupe.team/member/scott-claiborne/)
- [David Blackburn](https://loupe.team/member/david-blackburn/)
- [Karl Robrock](https://loupe.team/member/karl-robrock/)
- [Patrick Cummings](https://loupe.team/member/patrick-cummings/)
- [Josh Polansky](https://loupe.team/member/josh-polansky/)
- [Domonic Scism](https://loupe.team/member/domonic-scism/)
- [Nathan Schenk](https://loupe.team/member/nathan-schenk/)
- [Ashley Price](https://loupe.team/member/ashley-price/)
- [Alyssa Spoolstra](https://loupe.team/member/alyssa-spoolstra/)
- [Allison Benz](https://loupe.team/member/allison-benz/)

## Video

- [Git for PLCs - Using Gitflow in Automation](https://loupe.team/video/git-for-plcs-using-gitflow-in-automation/) - Multiple developers working with one repository work best with a common workflow. In this video, Matt explains what Gitflow is and how it's used at Loupe to keep repositories organized while creating features and shipping machinery.
- [Shop Day: Sheet Stock Gimbal](https://loupe.team/video/shop-day-sheet-stock-gimbal/) - It's hard to beat the aesthetics of carbon fiber and sheet metal. This week we assemble and test another camera gimbal made of sheet stock, all ordered from SendCutSend.
- [Unbox: GoFa](https://loupe.team/video/unbox-gofa/) - We're stoked to introduce this new collaborative robot from ABB and can't wait to test drive it in our robot workshop. If you want to GoFa, go together!
- [Shop Day: Knuckle Gimbal](https://loupe.team/video/shop-day-knuckle-gimbal/) - Another week, another gimbal. This time we test a gimbal we designed made of machined and welded aluminum, nicknamed the "knuckle." There's a lot of torque in that little ball of motors.
- [Unbox: Fixture Table](https://loupe.team/video/unbox-fixture-table/) - Giant heavy motors call for giant heavy tables. Revolutionary improvement!
- [Shop Day: GoFa and OnRobot Tools](https://loupe.team/video/shop-day-gofa-and-onrobot-tools/) - We love test drives. Today we're jamming with OnRobot attachments for our ABB GoFa collaborative robot.
- [Git for PLCs - Using RevInfo](https://loupe.team/video/git-for-plcs-using-revinfo/) - Machine builders and factories don't know the EXACT version of code running on their machines. In this video, Matt explains how Loupe's RevInfo tool embeds Git and Automation Studio data in every single software transfer, so you'll never be able to walk away from a machine with uncommitted, unbacked up code, ever again.
- [Unbox: Happy Holidays from Loupe](https://loupe.team/video/unbox-happy-holidays-from-loupe/) - A wrap on 2021 wouldn't be complete without our annual holiday unbox. Looking forward to all of the items we're going to collect "for our work" in 2022.
- [Unbox: Gaming PC](https://loupe.team/video/unbox-gaming-pc/) - Your weekly reminder that it is important to invest in video games for your work.
- [Unbox: Miter Gauge](https://loupe.team/video/unbox-miter-gauge/) - The year may be coming to a close, but our growing collection of shop tools shows no signs of slowing.
- [Formant TeleOp Test Drive](https://loupe.team/video/formant-teleop-test-drive/) - Can’t find the time these days to do your own robotic videography? Why not outsource to a ghost photographer with a video game controller? We partnered with Formant and Swanson Studios to take the cinematic reins over the web using a snappy tele-op interface with everything recorded to the cloud in realtime.
- [Unbox: Spot Bottles](https://loupe.team/video/unbox-spot-bottles/) - Quenching our thirst, while slowly amassing our own Spot fashion line.
- [Unbox: B&R Smart Motor](https://loupe.team/video/unbox-br-smart-motor/) - The Goldilocks of servo motors. If you're looking to daisy chain your motors with only power supply and ethernet, B&R has you covered.
- [Shop Day: Adapter for an Adapter](https://loupe.team/video/shop-day-adapter-for-an-adapter/) - Sometimes your adapter just needs... another adapter. The CNC router helps us whip up some temporary parts for testing a new camera gimbal.
- [Unbox: Knipex Crimper](https://loupe.team/video/unbox-knipex-crimper/) - Upgrading our workshop one German hand tool at a time.
- [Git for PLCs - Clone, Push and Pull](https://loupe.team/video/git-for-plcs-clone-push-and-pull/) - One of the most powerful parts of using Git is that it allows multiple developers to work together in parallel. In this video, Matt conceptually explains how Clone, Push and Pull keep your project synchronized to remote repositories and other team members.
- [EYL Card Wallet](https://loupe.team/video/eyl-card-wallet/) - Some days you Engineer Your Lifestyle, others you engineer yourself out of a Costanza wallet.
- [Unbox: Shuv](https://loupe.team/video/unbox-shuv/) - CI/CD for PLCs, but make it fashion.
- [Shop Day: Drawer Reorganization](https://loupe.team/video/shop-day-drawer-reorganization/) - A well organized tool chest speaks for itself.
- [Git for PLCs  - Part 2](https://loupe.team/video/git-for-plcs-part-2/) - Version control is available for PLCs and industrial controls. This second video, Matt explores 2 key concepts to co-development: branching and merging.
- [Unbox: CNC Extension](https://loupe.team/video/unbox-cnc-extension/) - With a few clicks and the right timing, you can effectively extend your CNC machine while meeting your new neighbors live on Unbox.
- [Zivid Two Test Drive](https://loupe.team/video/zivid-two-test-drive/) - This Zivid Two 3D camera is changing the game for robots and manufacturing technologies. When you're able to see with 3D cameras and add extra information into the process, there's a whole new world of capabilities for machines. Whether that’s grabbing, manipulating, avoiding and tracking, or just dealing with highly dynamic scenes - we're geeking out over the possibilities.
- [Git for PLCs](https://loupe.team/video/git-for-plcs/) - Many engineers don't realize version control tools are available for PLCs and industrial controls. This video series will start you on your journey away from File ➡️ Save As ➡️ Project-Name-Date.zip and into the world of distributed version control with Git.
- [Massive Motor](https://loupe.team/video/massive-motor/) - We like our motors at the extremes: cute and tiny or big and bulky. Can't wait to power this beast up.
- [Shared Memory with B&R Hypervisor](https://loupe.team/video/shared-memory-with-br-hypervisor/) - B&R's Industrial PC Hypervisor merges the realtime and general computing worlds by running dual operating systems simultaneously on the same hardware, unlocking possibilities like high-end user interface design or sophisticated database handling, to name a few. Here we dive into how these two sides exchange data at runtime using shared memory.
- [Workbench Addition](https://loupe.team/video/workbench-addition/) - Naturally, this falls into the "this is for my work" category. Why have one speed when you can have two? Stay tuned ⚙️ ⚙️
- [#learning: Unreal Engine](https://loupe.team/video/learning-unreal-engine/) - Get up and running with Unreal Engine. It’s more than a game engine, it’s a fast-prototyping tool for creating 3D tools and visualizations. It’s a huge topic, but in this #learning session we explore the basics of the UI, and Blueprints.
- [Embedded Performance, Off the Shelf](https://loupe.team/video/embedded-performance-off-the-shelf/) - Machine builders have been using embedded controls as part of their designs because there hasn’t been hardware on the market that can respond with microsecond precision and response times. Things have changed. Now, high performance FGPAs and DSPs are available, off the shelf, which can be incorporated into real time operating systems.
- [Send Cut Send](https://loupe.team/video/send-cut-send/) - We love lasers, we love CNCs, how could we pass up this beloved combination brought to us by SendCutSend?
- [Shop Day: SMB Surgery](https://loupe.team/video/shop-day-smb-surgery/) - Ever wonder what's under the hood of an ABB IRB 6700?
- [Cloudy Vision](https://loupe.team/video/cloudy-vision/) - "What big eyes you have!" The better to see you with 👀 Can't wait to test drive this incredible 3D camera. Thanks Zivid!
- [Hello B&R: Motion Control Simulation](https://loupe.team/video/hello-br-motion-control-simulation/) - Automation Studio’s motion simulation capabilities let you create and test code before the machine is built. When you need to move beyond a frictionless and load-free model, Full Simulation comes to the rescue! With just a few additional parameters, you can simulate the torque requirements, following error and tuning gains - changing an idealized simulation into an accurate digital twin.
- [Hello B&R: Installing Automation Studio](https://loupe.team/video/hello-br-installing-automation-studio/) - Automation Studio is a powerful tool, but do you have to buy it before you evaluate it? No way! This video walks through where to find the Automation Studio download, how to install it, and how to get a free 90-day evaluation license.
- [Get a Grip](https://loupe.team/video/get-a-grip/) - Adding some hands to our robot arms. Catch these OnRobot grippers in action at the workshop soon.
- [Shop Day: Aluminum Saw](https://loupe.team/video/shop-day-aluminum-saw/) - Welcome to Loupe's workshop, where tinkering is greatly encouraged. Sometimes it's the simple things that are so satisfying.
- [Shop Day: Gimbal Glue Up](https://loupe.team/video/shop-day-gimbal-glue-up/) - *Glue, glue glue. Screw, screw, screw* Putting this week's unboxed carbon fiber parts to good use.
- [Shop Day: TSO Square](https://loupe.team/video/shop-day-tso-square/) - TFW when your tools play nicely together. This TSO PE guide rail square and Festool track saw collab makes perpendicular cuts a breeze.
- [Shop Day: Gimbal Install](https://loupe.team/video/shop-day-gimbal-install/) - Come for the gimbal install, stay for the satisfying cable management.
- [Hello B&R: Custom Libraries, Functions, and Function Blocks](https://loupe.team/video/hello-br-custom-libraries-functions-and-function-blocks/) - Creating functions and function blocks are critical to creating quality code in our projects. In this overview, we’ll explore how to create a library, a function and a function block in Automation Studio from start to finish.
- [Dust No More](https://loupe.team/video/dust-no-more/) - It's tough to keep the workshop clean when we're sawing through plywood like it's going out of style. Shout out to Nordfab Ducting for this much-needed upgrade to our CNC dust collection at Loupe.
- [Safety Commander](https://loupe.team/video/safety-commander/) - For those who prefer an iPad interface over tiny non-responsive and resistive touchscreens.
- [Go Forth and Build!](https://loupe.team/video/go-forth-and-build/) - Don’t you just love bringing your digital creations to life? Just a few clicks and we’re off to build! Thanks Engitype for sending us these Markforged carbon fiber sample parts.
- [Web Handling 2.0](https://loupe.team/video/web-handling-2-0/) - Surely you didn't think we'd stop at just the Web Handling Book when we discovered there's a Handbook! Shout out to David Roisum for the mutual enthusiasm on the fundamentals and intricacies of web handling - you've got a fan club at Loupe.
- [Inxpect Test Drive](https://loupe.team/video/inxpect-test-drive/) - Naturally we had to test drive these radar based safety scanners after unboxing them. This technology from Inxpect can detect even the slightest vibrations, and allows people to get in and out of robot cells safely without cages or disturbing anything.
- [Trust in Collaboration](https://loupe.team/video/trust-in-collaboration/) - If you're looking for a savvy control cabinet integrator (and have a sweet tooth), Process Solutions has got you covered. Cheers to continued collaboration!
- [CNC Upgrade](https://loupe.team/video/cnc-upgrade/) - 27 pounds of blissful automated tool change coming to a CNC near you.
- [Mechanics of Web Handling 101](https://loupe.team/video/mechanics-of-web-handling-101/) - Fellow builders, this book is chock-full of information on how to design and operate machinery. Thanks for bestowing your wisdom and passion about web handling David Roisum!
- [3D Mice](https://loupe.team/video/3d-mice/) - For all of those wanting to give 'mouse arm' the boot and fly their camera around in 3D CAD models instead, look no further.
- [On the Radar](https://loupe.team/video/on-the-radar/) - Make your human areas safe from robots, and your robot areas safe from humans. Made possible by radar beams!
- [Troubleshooting](https://loupe.team/video/troubleshooting/) - Like a paramedic, you don’t necessarily want to see a Loupe engineer show up for this kind of work. But if this kind of work needs to be done, few are better at it than Nathan. Our cabinet went from being filled with gray electrical smoke to running production by showtime in less than 24 hours.
- [O3D Test Drive](https://loupe.team/video/o3d-test-drive/) - We're machine designers, and Loupe is always looking for new technologies to unlock machine potential. Lately, we've been having fun testing out the O3D camera capabilities along with an iPad application to see if they can communicate, retrieve information and send commands - all while living in different states. Stay tuned!
- [The Future is 4K](https://loupe.team/video/the-future-is-4k/) - Virtual meetings are here to stay. Time to up the webcam game and appear in beautiful high definition for all of your fellow Zoom friends.
- [Office commute 2.0](https://loupe.team/video/office-commute-2-0/) - Did we mention that working extremely remote is okay at Loupe? Join our highly distributed team, where the office is where you make it.
- [Dare Mighty Things](https://loupe.team/video/dare-mighty-things/) - When you make a parachute for a robot that lands on Mars be sure to code something cool into it (and get in touch with Tom Sachs).
- [What's your Gocation?](https://loupe.team/video/whats-your-gocation/) - Why locate when you can Gocate? Looking forward to all sorts of scanning with these Gocators from LMI Technologies.
- [Intelligent Tracks](https://loupe.team/video/intelligent-tracks/) - 🎶 One of these things is not like the other 🎶 Learn why people are using these linear motor tracks and what makes them so revolutionary.
- [Stellar Connection](https://loupe.team/video/stellar-connection/) - *Space internet* Need we say more?
- [Top Notch Toolbox](https://loupe.team/video/top-notch-toolbox/) - Never underestimate the power of well organized and transportable tools. Thanks Festool.
- [Active Listening](https://loupe.team/video/active-listening/) - When you're on Zoom calls 24/7, it’s important to be a good listener - so treat your ears accordingly.
- [Stop, Hammer Time](https://loupe.team/video/stop-hammer-time/) - Whether it's tools to make things, or a book about making things, we’ve got you covered.
- [Industrial Computer](https://loupe.team/video/industrial-computer/) - No shortage of parts inside this industrial PC. B&R’s APC910 takes advantage of modular accessory components, so there’s no need to make continuous adjustments to the PC hardware over time.
- [Box of Tricks](https://loupe.team/video/box-of-tricks/) - Magician: "As you can see, there are no trap doors, no hidden compartments."
- [Hello Dolly](https://loupe.team/video/hello-dolly/) - Here's your opportunity to brag about lifting 5000 lb robots without using a forklift.
- [Picture Perfect](https://loupe.team/video/picture-perfect/) - First comes the unbox, then comes the test drive. We’re having lots of fun exploring our bunkers with this Motion-Cam3D from Photoneo.
- [Industrial Instruments](https://loupe.team/video/industrial-instruments/) - “The only thing cooler than drilling holes, is drilling cute countersink holes.” Enjoying McMaster-Carr and Tools Today everyday!
- [These Are a Few of My Favorite Things](https://loupe.team/video/these-are-a-few-of-my-favorite-things/) - Speed ✔️ Accuracy ✔️ Point Clouds ✔️ LASERS ✔️ Thanks Photoneo for lending us this incredible 3D camera!
- [Hello Docker](https://loupe.team/video/hello-docker/) - “The bees knees”, that's how Jesse Cox describes Docker, a software containerization, virtualization, and deployment tool. We turned our #learning session inside-out to show you how Docker works and how it can be used to build rich stacks.
- [Here's to a Year](https://loupe.team/video/heres-to-a-year/) - Participation credit for all! Round of applause to everyone making it through a year in quarantine.
- [Up & Up](https://loupe.team/video/up-up/) - As you may have come to learn, there are no limits to axis helper possibilities at Loupe.
- [Elbow Room](https://loupe.team/video/elbow-room/) - Loupe’s exploratory process can vary far and wide, and needn’t be confined to the office. Sometimes it calls for a MacGyver setup in Brian's rural garage, where the goal is to literally break a 3D printed elbow.
- [Hello B&R: AWS Greengrass V2](https://loupe.team/video/hello-br-aws-greengrass-v2/) - Greengrass updated to version 2 in late 2020 which unlocked a new level of IIoT capabilities. With simple recipes you can deploy an entire software stack and manage deployment versions from anywhere in the world. This video will step you through the preparation, installation, and use of AWS’s IoT Greengrass version 2 on the B&R Automation hardware platform running Debian 10.
- [Precious Cargo](https://loupe.team/video/precious-cargo/) - Next up on our adorably compact hardware series, we’ve got the shrinky dinks of servo motors from B&R. Can't wait to use this little powerhouse. *Loupe futuristic hard hat sold separately*
- [No Couplers Necessary](https://loupe.team/video/no-couplers-necessary/) - Best things come in small packages. This B&R gearbox is compact and doesn't require any other parts. A worthy purchase.
- [Trust in Collaborative Robots](https://loupe.team/video/trust-in-collaborative-robots/) - We’re big proponents of collaboration, including collaborative robots! Looking forward to working side by side with ABB’s dual arm Yumi.
- [Hello B&R: Powerlink Redundancy In Under 2 Minutes](https://loupe.team/video/hello-br-powerlink-redundancy-in-under-2-minutes/) - On my first project, I was wholly unprepared for how easy Powerlink is! When I learned it also supported ring redundancy without any complicated configuration, I knew the right thing to do was make a blistering fast demo of setting it up.
- [Game On](https://loupe.team/video/game-on/) - Video games are the best interfaces between humans and computers that have ever been invented. So why wouldn't you want your controller to look the part? Very excited to use this wireless controller from Fort Robotics.
- [Robots & Chainsaws](https://loupe.team/video/robots-chainsaws/) - Somebody came to us and said, “we want to try putting a chainsaw on a robot.” We agreed and replied, “yes, let’s put a chainsaw on a robot.”
- [Red Means Stop](https://loupe.team/video/red-means-stop/) - No wires? No worries. Looking forward to using this safety rated wireless e-stop switch from FORT Robotics very soon.
- [Hello B&R: IIoT with MQTT and AWS](https://loupe.team/video/hello-br-iiot-with-mqtt-and-aws/) - This video will walk you through connecting your B&R Automation controllers to AWS; the supercomputers we rely on every day for web applications and technology infrastructure. Connecting to the AWS IoT Core is the first step to building applications with serverless computing, machine learning, AR/VR, etc…
- [Spot Swag](https://loupe.team/video/spot-swag/) - This swag was too good to follow our traditional color scheme. Huge thanks to George Retseck for the ‘Spot on’ illustration. We love our robot dog apparel.
- [Award-winning Partnership](https://loupe.team/video/award-winning-partnership/) - We’re very excited to be working with Boeing on some revolutionary new projects, and we’re looking forward to sharing why we received this non-secret award for super secret activities in the future.
- [Measuring Up](https://loupe.team/video/measuring-up/) - What happens if your 2D machine vision system is not measuring up? Add another dimension! Loupe concept engineer Jonathan McClain experiments with ifm’s O3D time-of -flight camera and talks point cloud data.
- [Don't Think](https://loupe.team/video/dont-think/) - Sometimes it's that simple.
- [Virtual Holiday Party 3.0](https://loupe.team/video/virtual-holiday-party-3-0/) - A remote workforce calls for a top-notch remote holiday party. If you’re looking for virtual activity inspiration, Loupe has got you covered. This year’s celebration included a cross-country unboxing, a festive cookie bake-off and socializing on Gather, a hybrid world of Sims and Zelda you never knew you needed.
- [A Quarantine Tour of Loupe](https://loupe.team/video/a-quarantine-tour-of-loupe/) - To all of those who miss the office or can’t wait for a proper in-person visit when the coast is clear, check out this 4K video tour of Loupe under quarantine.
- [Hello Hypervisor](https://loupe.team/video/hello-hypervisor/) - Advanced automated systems require both real-time control and a powerful operating system. You can have both! This video will show you how to integrate the Hypervisor from B&R Automation with the APC and PPC and build your own powerful operating system alongside. This will enable you to flex your development muscles the way they were intended to be.
- [Trust your Sensors](https://loupe.team/video/trust-your-sensors/) - When doing interesting things with robots, it’s important to feel what your robot is sensing. Shout out to ATI for creating this accurate, reliable multi-axis force torque sensor.
- [B&R Automation Studio Quick Start](https://loupe.team/video/br-automation-studio-quick-start/) - Imagine you can start building your project before the hardware arrives! This video will show you how to get started working in B&R Automation's Automation Studio.
- [Build it Yourself](https://loupe.team/video/build-it-yourself/) - A unbox milestone! Shout out to Vention for keeping us busy.
- [Tagging with Spot](https://loupe.team/video/tagging-with-spot/) - Despite their name, AprilTags can be enjoyed by your robots year round.
- [Future Proof](https://loupe.team/video/future-proof/) - The colors may have changed, but the innovative technology from B&R has remained tried and true.
- [Workshop Upgrade](https://loupe.team/video/workshop-upgrade/) - Gone are the days of lugging plywood on and off the CNC machine by hand.
- [Adept Adapting](https://loupe.team/video/adept-adapting/) - Physical manifestations of your dream adapter brackets are just a few clicks away. Interesting things to come as we pair this with our new IRB1200!
- [Robotiq Gripper](https://loupe.team/video/robotiq-gripper/) - Sometimes you need more than an arm to accomplish something important. Let’s give our robot a hand.
- [Screen Time](https://loupe.team/video/screen-time/) - Even remote workspaces need the occasional upgrade.
- [Small (robot) Talk](https://loupe.team/video/small-robot-talk/) - Looks can be deceiving. Don’t let the size of this compact powerhouse from ABB Robotics fool you.
- [Welcome Spot](https://loupe.team/video/welcome-spot/) - Your question: “What does it do?” Our answer: “What could it do?”
- [So Fresh, So Clean](https://loupe.team/video/so-fresh-so-clean/) - This little cleaner will annihilate grease and gunk from fuel injectors, dirty mechanical components and the occasional bicycle part.
- [Cool Points](https://loupe.team/video/cool-points/) - Forecast calls for clouds. Point clouds!
- [LOUPE LEGO](https://loupe.team/video/loupe-lego/) - “This is for my work.”
- [Mini-Cinematics](https://loupe.team/video/mini-cinematics/) - There is no limit to small high-res cameras and adorable tripods. And did we mention LASERS.
- [Machine Vision](https://loupe.team/video/machine-vision/) - B&R’s not one to ship a “me too” product. Instead they look at the technology and think about how to revolutionize the way things are done. Integrating machine vision to the rest of the control system in a B&R way opens up some really interesting possibilities. Concept Engineer Jonathan explains here.
- [Dream Big](https://loupe.team/video/dream-big/) - Picture books can be enjoyed at any age, especially if the pages are filled with awe-inspiring NASA shots.
- [Breathe Easy](https://loupe.team/video/breathe-easy/) - Regardless of where you find yourself in the virtual world, be sure to have a mask (or two) on hand.
- [Virtual Cue Cards](https://loupe.team/video/virtual-cue-cards/) - We’re all talking into our cameras these days, and now we'll never be at a loss for words.
- [Tools of the Future](https://loupe.team/video/tools-of-the-future/) - Don’t ask what we paid for these - just know that it was worth it. *click click click*
- [Take it Easy](https://loupe.team/video/take-it-easy/) - We could all use a reminder to take it easy on ourselves and those around us as we all do our best to get through difficult and stressful times.
- [Live at Loupe S2E5](https://loupe.team/video/live-at-loupe-s2e5/) - Last week during Live at Loupe, Josh presented the first demo of the digital twin, and the team reviewed the model with real-time functionality. Until this point, there has been visualization of the Trak and the robot, but the demo finally provided a unified vision of the machine. Throughout the season, details of the model have become more granular with each iteration; moving from overall layout and functionality, to exploring individual components of the scene (like the end effector and the product itself). With breakthroughs in Fusion360 and Blender, the hierarchy of the robot is able to be preserved, revolutionizing the file sharing process and making updates far more efficient.
- [An 8-minute Introduction to Loupe](https://loupe.team/video/an-8-minute-introduction-to-loupe/) - This is the complete story of who we are, what we do, and why. All in less time than it takes to walk back and forth to the coffee machine.
- [Live at Loupe S2E4](https://loupe.team/video/live-at-loupe-s2e4/) - Last week marked the second of Loupe’s six week sprint, which shifted from project scoping to development in our iterative Ship in Six process. Josh brought the team up to speed on the HMI 3D model progress. The Trak application has been semi experimental, so Josh focused on turning it into a real machine prototype, and created a subset of tools to make modifications quick and easy. Jonathan gave updates on how to build software applications, and explained different ways to interact with the Trak. The team spent some time discussing the Trak hierarchy and functionality of sectors and process points - dubbing them ‘decision points’, which ultimately direct traffic and control where the shuttle goes. After reviewing Trak applications, Josh followed up with some ideas surrounding error recovery; which accounts for what happens if a shuttle stops and how to continue. The team weighed out the importance of including error recovery in the first demo, and decided that minimal effort should be the guiding factor.
- [Necessary Provisions](https://loupe.team/video/necessary-provisions/) - What are you stocking up on?
- [Loupe Trak Packer](https://loupe.team/video/loupe-trak-packer/) - Loupe's New Machine Concept to revolutionize case packing, featuring groundbreaking technologies from B&R Industrial Automation and ABB Robotics.
- [Live at Loupe S2E3](https://loupe.team/video/live-at-loupe-s2e3/) - Last week during Live at Loupe, we began our first week in sprint mode, dedicating time to discuss the tools needed to start a digital twin of the Trak Packer. Blackburn kicked off the meeting, giving an agenda overview and defining the scope of the project. He quickly turned it over to Jonathan, who brought the team up to speed on what they have so far, which included demos of recipe visualizations. Josh shared existing B&R Automation Studio infrastructure, and our own libraries and software. At Loupe, we use a lot of open source tools, including 3D graphics software like three.js, in our user interfaces. Josh’s overview of our projects exemplified the benefits of a Machine-Centric approach, unifying robotics with discrete automation components, all as one piece of software. The team was also joined by Andrew, who illustrated the importance of collaborative efforts between DevOps and users. Practicing continuous integration eliminates barriers throughout the process to keep projects and feedback moving quickly.
- [Live at Loupe S2E2](https://loupe.team/video/live-at-loupe-s2e2/) - This season of Live at Loupe, we’re turning our Trak Packer Concept from season one into a complete digital twin in a 6 week sprint. Last week, the team wrapped up the final scope meeting and clarified which demo and development tools would be the best choice for this phase. After weighing out the pros and cons between RobotWare and Automation Runtime, the team decided that a Machine-Centric approach would be a better fit for an interactive demo that’s easy to distribute (without having to download/install RobotStudio). The group noted that the final build will include RobotStudio, but it can be simulated with a Machine-Centric approach for the digital twin. In addition to the software, David Nichols emphasized the value in having DevOps integration, which offers greater visibility of refinements to the demo in real-time. David Blackburn defined the product infeed and outfeed modeling, and the team agreed on its parameters. Next up, the team prepares to move into the official sprint with these details in place. Tune in to watch as our team begins building a digital twin!
- [David Nichols on This Is Automation](https://loupe.team/video/david-nichols-on-this-is-automation/) - Prepare yourself to be radicalized: Here’s Loupe CEO David Nichols explaining why he’s been excited to work with B&R Industrial Automation for the last 15 years. Thanks to Cory Dowless for hosting this interview on This Is Automation. David Nichols (00:00): Hi, this is David Nichols. I'm CEO at Loupe and to me, automation is why would we do something that a robot could do for us? Cory (00:08): Welcome to today's episode of This is Automation. Today, we have a special guest remote. We have David Nichols. How's it going David? David Nichols (00:30): Hello, hello. Cory (00:32): I guess to get us kicked off in the right direction, we can start how we always do and just David if you can, give us a quick introduction to who you are and your relationship with the B&R. I know before we hit record, you were telling me about writing [cam automats 00:00:47] in 2005 and in your apartment, so I don't know how far back you want to go, but you apparently go back pretty far. David Nichols (00:55): We'll go back all the way to the beginning. No, and not that far compared to some people that I know whose names I won't mention. I don't want to make them feel old, but yeah, my name is David Nichols. I'm the CEO of a company, Loupe, that's L-O-U-P-E, like the small magnifying glass. We're the B&R partner for a lot of the West Coast, so Northern California, Oregon, and Washington. I've been working with B&R as we said, for quite a while now. I initially got introduced to B&R as it was working for another automation distribution company, called PacMation. David Nichols (01:34): It was back in 2004 or 2005-2006. One of the products that PacMation started working with B&R and I was really interested in learning about B&R because the reason that I had gotten into automation in the first place was because I was really interested in software, I was really interested in what computers were capable of doing and scripting things and programming things. Automation was just the coolest way to do that because when you ran your code or when you hit enter, you didn't just see a bunch of pixels fly by on your screen, but something happened in the physical world. That was what really hooked me about automation. David Nichols (02:13): Anyway, coming from that software background, even back then, I think we're still proud of that, still talk about it a lot today. B&R as a software development platform, B&R as a software capability was always really distinctive and really powerful. That was what got me hooked on it even back then. That's how I got into Automation Studio, version two point something. It's come a long way in that time, but it's kind of maintained the power and that's something we've really taken advantage of over the years. People really appreciate when we work together. Cory (02:46): Nice. I wanted to talk today kind of just in general about automation. Then, a little bit about how Loupe works and some of the stuff that you guys work on because I know that there's some neat stuff that you guys are involved in and then, just more about how you see B&R fit into the automation market and kind of what makes B&R special in your opinion. I guess before we dive too much into that, you mentioned that Loupe is a partner with B&R, so maybe you could just give us a quick intro to Loupe and your business philosophy. Yeah, just a little bit about you guys. David Nichols (03:23): Yeah, sure. We've been thinking a lot about that, I think, the core of our company and our opinions and what we're excited about I'd say has been very consistent and reliable for the last 15 years or so, or 12 years since we founded the company in 2007, but we've always been engineers, so we weren't very good at describing what that was. I've learned in the meantime that there are people called professional communicators, they're called marketing people. They can take all those things that we hand wave about and are excited about and put that into words and images and ways of describing what you do that are really powerful. David Nichols (04:05): Our company is called Loupe. That's a new name for a company as of about six months ago and I'd say the purpose of our company, the mission of our company, what we're all here to do and what we're excited about is really revolutionizing what's going on with machines. There's a lot of trends, there's a lot of new possibilities, there's a lot of changes in technology recently and over the last 200 years that we think are really awesome and positive for humanity, so we want to help push the boundaries of that and help make new things possible. Cory (04:44): Yeah, for sure. I think B&R has a similar mission, so I think we're aligned very well in that way. Could you talk about what does an average customer look like for you and within that, what does an average project look like? I know I've seen some things on social media you guys are doing with some videographers and things like that with the robotics. Could you just talk a little bit about those? David Nichols (05:12): Yeah, sure. Yeah, I would say it's not a coincidence that we work with B&R because the product and the company, we share that world view, we share those values with B&R. That's why we started working with B&R in the first place, so that's definitely something that we have in common that's not an accident. I would say the similar thing about our customers, so if you look at... my description of what B&R is, going back decades now, is that B&R is a company that provides controllers and automation technology for machines where the technology of the machine is really what's important about it. There's different ways companies can be strong. They can be strong because they have a really powerful sales channel, really powerful marketing capabilities. When I think about a B&R customer, I think about a customer, usually an equipment builder, company that makes machines as their business, an OEM, and that company really distinguishes himself on our machines have the best technology in the world and that's what's great about them. That's why people buy them, that's why those companies are successful is by being innovative and being really capable in terms of the technology in the machines. David Nichols (06:35): When I think about specific examples, sort of profile what's great in both our customers and B&R customers, they are companies that are like that and that's because they hit throughput numbers or scalability numbers that are just untouchable. When you think about a company that makes bottling machines, you think about some of the biggest bottling machines and the biggest bottling equipment builders in the world, you think about these huge [turrets 00:07:05], they're moving 10s of thousands of units per hour through these machines and you really need incredible technology to be able to achieve that and do it well, and do it reliably. That's something that in a lot of cases with our customers, that's the case as well. David Nichols (07:24): It doesn't always have to be high performance, but there's always some technology leverage that's being put to work. We also work with companies that work in secondary packaging, which if you don't know what that is, that's the end of the packaging line. It tends to be slower, it's maybe you're stacking boxes up or maybe you're putting things in boxes. It's not what's considered the complicated or high-speed part of the line. There's still a huge opportunity for technology to have an impact in those cases and even equipment builders who make their machines completely out of bent sheet metal and stuff that would otherwise be considered dumb, you can make a great machine and bring great technology to that machine and use the benefits of the B&R platform even on these machines that otherwise people wouldn't think of as super sophisticated or super high-end. There's still a way to make a great machine where technology is really the key piece of it in those contexts as well. David Nichols (08:30): That's what... I think maybe that's a long answer, but that's what I feel like is in common with the B&R customer and people that we typically work with. That's in industries like packaging and aerospace, people that are making computer chips or equipment for making computer chips, stuff like that. Cory (08:47): Yeah. You mentioned at the top of the episode that Loupe is a partner for B&R and I know distribution partners is a common term in the industry, but I think the relationship that B&R has with our partners is a little bit different and the expectations may not be exactly what people think of when they hear partner. Could you talk about that a little bit and how that's different from the rest of the market? David Nichols (09:14): Yeah, sure. Partner I think is a term that's chosen because if you say distributor, people think of a warehouse where there's a bunch of boxes on the shelves. Obviously, in the B&R channel, there are such places, but it doesn't really encapsulate what the relationship is between both either our company, Loupe and B&R, or our two companies and our customers. I think the big difference is the sense of collaboration, the sense of we're working together on something that if it's successful, it's going to help our companies grow really a lot and amazing things are going to happen. We're bringing pieces to the table, whether that's technology or capability or maybe there's some programming skills or some other integration aspect where we have a contribution to make, but without people on the equipment side saying, "Hey, there's a great opportunity here if we can figure out a packaging machine to be able to do this," that's something where we're starting really from a whiteboard or we're starting from that vision in... I guess one way to say it when we're talking with people is, they know their industry and they know their field. They know their process so well, but we know all these aspects of technology and software and capability. When you put that together, when you can overlap that, really amazing things are possible. David Nichols (10:39): It goes much deeper than just a supplier or someone who you give us a purchase order and we fulfill on-time and at a good price. That's what people think of when they think of a distribution company, but it's really much deeper than that for us. Both with B&R and with our customers, it's really deeply collaborative, so we've got to come up with different words to describe that other than distribution. Cory (11:06): Maybe shifting the conversation a little bit to automation in general. You've kind of already touched on it. It can be really technically complex. You need knowledge of both the control side and the automation side as well as that specific process and that's where that partnership with the customers comes in. I think a lot of things are changing in the market right now as far as new technologies that are coming out. We're making, you mentioned 200 years ago, the difference from 200 years ago to now is maybe what we'll see from now to 20 years in the future just because of the rate at which technology is changing and the rate at which automation is being adopted. Where do you see automation making the biggest impacts right now? David Nichols (11:53): I think it's a really interesting time for automation because, and what immediately pops to mind is this quote from Marc Andreessen who's a partner at... a big venture capitalist, very successful. He also was part of the founding team at Netscape. He has this shorthand for saying, "software is eating the world," which is a little menacing a little bit, but the fact is computing and all these aspects of technology, these are things that are changing extremely rapidly, they're impacting the world in really incredible ways, both positive and negative. That's filtering into the industrial worlds in some of the same ways. It has an impact literally everywhere and it I go down the list of projects and the things that we're talking people with, you have everything from...like, I mentioned agriculture. How do we feed the entire world? Automation and robotics and software has a huge role to play in the future of that. David Nichols (13:02): We're working on there's areas of construction. Where do houses come from? Currently, they're built by hand, by people onsite, so is that what that looks for the future? These are things that you're talking about fundamental human needs in terms of material, providing in a material way. These are all places where automation has an impact. I think literally everywhere you look there's some way that automation is going to be touching it. In fact, the other shorthand way to say that is if you look around you, literally every physical thing around you, there's often a story of machines about how it got to you. Everything comes from machines. David Nichols (13:52): If you look at a pen on your desk or you look at your shoes, you can just imagine the army of machines that... and people as well, like no doubt about that. That's not something that people really are typically exposed to or even think about, but it's all around them, everywhere they go. That's, I think, not to go super abstract on that, but machines and production technology has a huge role to play in the lives of people and alternative energy and other ways of a... it's in everything. That's what's really cool about what we do. We get to get involved in all those different things and hopefully, make the world a better place by improving that. Cory (14:42): Yeah. It's probably no surprise to anybody listening, but I know I think before I was working with B&R and really understood how even OEM's, that there even were companies making machines. I think my preconceived notion is, okay, Coca Cola makes Coke, so they make the bottles and the caps and the labels and they put it all together and they make Coke. Right? David Nichols (15:07): I had the same set of assumptions. Yeah. It's not like you really think about it. It's just like, I go to the store and there's Coke there. I don't even think about where it comes from. Cory (15:17): Yeah, so this is... I think working with OEM customer and even the manufacturing facilities directly has given me a really unique, and maybe different perspective, on just like the global supply chain, like you're saying. You look at a pen on your desk and there's probably a machine that does the injection molded plastic parts and there's a machine that does the mixing for the inks. There's some metal forming machine that does the clip, so on and so forth. There's so much involved in the supply chain of that is just beautiful in way, I think. David Nichols (15:54): It's invisible to most people. In fact, the cocktail party answer of, so what do you do, I mean, normally I would just say robots, basically. That's not exactly the case always, but sometimes I would say, "There's these big buildings where everything comes from called factories." [crosstalk 00:16:17] let's start there. Inside the factory there's a lot of machine... I would have the same expression where you don't necessarily think, yeah, Coke would be a good example. Coke doesn't make bottling machines; Coke doesn't make the machines that make the plastic that makes the mold. There's a whole world of machines behind that. If you look at something like an iPhone, it's even more... and you just sort of fly through that thing in your mind and think of all the little chips and all the circuit boards and all the plastics and materials, all those things come from lots and lots of machines. It just is not something that most people typically have direct experience with, but it's fun to work on. Cory (17:02): Yeah, for sure. It's exciting the range of opportunities that we get to be involved with, the different markets, but working with these OEM customers, what are you seeing them driving for on their next-generation machines. Obviously, that trickles up from the end-user, but where do you see them going in the future? David Nichols (17:26): My personal bias on that question about what's the opportunity, how do you say that really succinctly to me is, is your machine made of software because a lot of machines are made out of bicycle parts and they could have been built that way a hundred years ago. That's fine, but there are a lot of new capabilities that come from software that if you can really say, with a straight face, and that's really what powers our machine, that's really the material of our machines is software, that to me is something that a lot of cutting edge equipment builders are thinking about. There's different shorthand ways of saying that. David Nichols (18:14): The Industry 4.0 is a branding or an umbrella term for a lot of the ways in which software can contribute to manufacturing. Thinking about smaller batch sized, thinking about how to make the equipment more flexible and instead of being purely mechanical. Those are all things that I think the leading-edge equipment builders are thinking about these days because that's where a lot of the new opportunities are. I don't discount any of the mechanical aspects as well because obviously, they're so tightly coupled together, but when you can bring software into your machines, there's a lot of capability that's come about in the last 10, 20, 30 years where's there's really new opportunities. Companies that do that, I think, are in a good position to grow. The world is changing because of software. Cory (19:19): Let's talk a little bit about robotics, which is something I know that, with the ABB acquisition, B&R is getting more involved in. I know that something that Loupe has definitely been involved in. What kind of problems are you solving with robotics that maybe you weren't able to before and where do you see the market headed with robotics? David Nichols (19:43): Sure. I can tell you one of the really interesting things about robotics, and I should define what the term is. When we use the term robotics, we tend to be talking about what you would see in a car commercial where it's a six axis arm, it's throwing sparks everywhere because it's welding body panels together, and if you look at the history of that type of device, that kind of robot, thousands and thousands and thousands of them have been built mostly for the automotive industry. Any of the robot suppliers, you can look at their charts and you can look at their internal marketing, that's basically where they come from. It's the legacy of it. David Nichols (20:26): They're really good at doing that. If you need to weld sheet metal panels together, boy, there are so many great robots for you to use, but if you try to get them to do other things, there can be some limitations. They're not that great at doing... I'm speaking broadly here, tasks that are more flexible or not quite as repeatable as go exactly to this point and pinch together and weld and then do that over and over and over again exactly the same way, but the interesting thing is, because those robots were built thousands at a time, for what they're capable of mechanically, they tend to be really inexpensive. If you take the robot and you are able to inject a bunch of new software to give it an entirely new brain, then you can do some really powerful things because they're basically lying around waiting to be used for that purpose. David Nichols (21:31): If you can augment them with other sensors, if you can make the software of them more flexible, if you can make them able to consume information from different vision systems or other sensing systems or spatial systems to make them more accurate, to make them better aligned in terms of process, to get them so that they can be more precise in time and space, there's a lot of new things you can do with that robot besides weld autobody panels together. That's been a big theme of our company in the last handful of years is using those robots, kind of lobotomizing them or giving them a lot of new software capabilities, so that they can be more responsive to what a machine needs to be or they can be more tightly integrated into a machine, so that they can do new things. Because of that interesting cost dynamic with them being readily available, there's a lot of new opportunities. You find robots finding their way into all of these new applications where they weren't used before and there're examples in eCommerce, in agriculture, in packaging where the process flexibility and the software that you're bringing to bear to make that robot behave, versus just run a routine, that's something that is really cool and people that see that are people that we get excited about that. We've had some awesome projects and we've worked that. David Nichols (23:06): There are examples in aerospace where you take an off-the-shelf robot, put a bunch of new sensors on it, do a bunch of spatial mapping to it and all of a sudden, it can drill holes super precisely, I guess precisely enough that they can be used for airplane and aerospace manufacturing. That would be an example that you can look to and there's some really inspiring companies that have work that they talk about publicly. Like, I'm a big fan and appreciator of what Electroimpact does and other companies like that. If you haven't seen them do that, they're taking these robots and using them in new contexts all the time. I don't see that slowing down. In fact, I see that increasing over the next handful of year. We're pretty excited to learn a lot about how to take those robots and do new things with them. Cory (23:49): Yep. You said something I want to circle back on about robots not being good at things that aren't repetitive, point-to-point movements. David Nichols (23:59): Mm-hmm (affirmative). Cory (24:00): First, I wanted to ask you about, what's your opinion on collaborative robots? Is that something... it's one of those buzzwords. You mentioned Industry 4.0, collaborative robotics, it's something that people get really excited about. I mean, is your opinion that collaborative robotics is a new generation of robotics or is it just another product that's going to find its niche and it will be a part of a broader automation solution? David Nichols (24:27): Sure. Well, I love a good buzzword even though I also roll my eyes at them in a really hard way. It's almost like a meme, when new things come out, people get excited about it. We're excited about it, too. When it comes to collaborative robots, I think there's two ways to think about that and I guess I'll just...these are my labels. I don't know if anybody else agrees with me, but when you talk about a collaborative robot, there're some robots... and ABB makes robots like this, but I have to say, setting our ABB association aside, I think when people think about collaborative robots, they're thinking about like a universal. Cory (25:09): Yep, right. David Nichols (25:10): A robot that has a low enough payload, it can't necessarily hurt you, if it bumps into you it will stop, and you can teach it in these very human ways. When you go and read about how new technologies come to take over the whole world, a lot of times it looks like that because it's a toy and it's payload is really low and it can hardly do what my robot does. Anytime you hear that, you should be very afraid because that's where technologies come from that end up going up that curve and becoming really powerful. I expect that to be the case for robots that look like that. David Nichols (25:49): ABB has a product called a YuMi. It's very similar, so we definitely look at tech companies like Universal and say, "Yeah, you're definitely onto something here. This is latched on to something that's inspiring a lot of people," so I'm a huge supporter of that. Love that. We're friends with the Universal distributor here, out on the West Coast, but I think all that, comma, but I think we're also coming from a background on the control side where building advanced safety capabilities into industrial machines is something we're very comfortable with. B&R as a platform, has been really a pioneer of... I would say for a long time. Like, five or 10 years ago, we would talk about, hey, you can build a programmable safety system and you can build some really interesting powerful technology for getting operators deeper into your machines, for getting operators able to interact with your machines without hitting any... keeping the throughput's extremely high. Right? Cory (26:57): Mm-hmm (affirmative). David Nichols (26:57): Making so that someone can walk through an entire cell and the safety system is aware of where they are and can either stop different pieces of equipment of move different parts of the machine at safe enough speeds where a person can get out of the way in a certified way, in a legitimately safe way. That's something that we're very comfortable with coming from the PLC and safety control side. David Nichols (27:21): To put that together with a product like... that would normally be considered a conventional robot. It has a huge payload, it has a huge reach, it's the robot exactly that you're thinking of that's shooting sparks and welding car bodies together. In our mind, there's no reason that robot can't be collaborative as well because if you augment it with safety systems, if you're using the area scanners, if you're using maps and there's ways to safely establish where humans are and have them being interacting with machines in a way that's very, very flexible. We have a robot in the middle of our workspace in Portland that it doesn't have cages built around it. It just has area scanners, so if a human or if anything comes in with range where the robot could reach it, the robot is certified to run below a safe speed. That's enough to make the robot collaborative, even though it can move at four meters per second, even though it can swing a payload of 40 kilograms around. David Nichols (28:21): I feel like there's a lot of opportunities there where that heavy industrial, that high throughput, super-high speed, can be made collaborative and that's where a lot of our attention is going right now because of the software and the safety capability is there to do it. There's no reason why this robot that can swing 500 pounds around shouldn't be able to have an operator walk up right next to it and not be scared or not be in danger. When you can do that, I feel like it opens up a lot of new possibilities for cell layouts, for productivity, for ways of controlling robots where the humans are right up next to it. They're head's right down next to the tool point and that's safe. David Nichols (29:04): We're really excited about that capability because it's putting together high-performance, high-throughput, high-speed, high-payload together, but operating in a safe way very close to humans. There's a lot of interesting technology that's coming out that's in support of that trend as well. Cory (29:20): I'm jumping back now to my point about robots not being good at non-repetitive tasks. Do you see that changing at all with machine learning and AI starting to find its way into industrial applications or have you thought about that yet? David Nichols (29:37): Absolutely. I think the analogy that I would sometimes use is, if the process is like a... This might age me or put me within a certain range, but I just imagine like a cassette tape and if you hit play on the cassette tape, and that basically could describe your robot process, you're probably missing some opportunities for flexibility. You're probably missing some opportunities to be making decisions, defining behaviors, responding to what's actually happening with the cell or with the product or with the variability in what you're do... if a cassette tape could work, then you're missing something. Cory (30:20): Right. David Nichols (30:21): Or there could be more opportunities. Even car body welding, different cars are coming down the line these days from car to car. That's not even enough anymore for I think those kind of contexts. Yeah, making machines that are capable of consuming information from other systems, that could be a machine learning system, that could be a vision system, that could be a system that's looking at a stack of boxes and saying, "Where are the division between the boxes because this pallet is completely random and I need to be able to unpack it." Right? All of those, the way that a robot moves, the way that a robot plans and makes decision in terms of I'm going to pick up this and then I'm going to pick up this, then I'm going to pick up this. David Nichols (31:04): Those are all really valuable problems to figure out, but the cool thing, like I mentioned earlier at the start of the conversation was, there's physical limitations in the world, so how a robot moves, where a robot moves, if you don't know that ahead of time, it can be tricky. There are these mathematical things called singularities. You don't want to be running your robot through them, so how do you avoid them? What do you so that if it tells you to pick up a box, what will be the center of the singularity point you probably don't want to do that? Having that flexibility, it can be tricky. What's really interesting and what we get really excited about is the degree to which all this technology that's being developed, it really does all plug together. Whether you're making machines, or we're in the context where we are making machines, and the machines are made of computers. Well, computers can also run technology that has been developed for video games, computers can also run user interface technology that comes from websites. These are both areas where just billions and billions of dollars have been spent on making the coolest stuff possible. There's no reason why it can't be used in machines. It all plugs together because everything is made of computers now. David Nichols (32:28): That's what's really exciting is to kind of look in our peripheral vision and finding something from a different space or bring it across from a place where it's considered to be normal or taken for granted even. That is really powerful and there are development techniques, there are software tools, there are a lot of things that I think would be taken for granted, or not even considered state of the art, in the world of software where if you can get them across that chasm, if you can get them across that bridge to industrial space, you can have a huge impact. Cory (33:01): A question I get a lot is why would I use B&R instead of X, Y, or Z controller? What's your answer to that question? David Nichols (33:09): My answer to that question is everything that I've said so far. If you're going to use a B&R controller exactly the same way that you would use a different platform that didn't have as distinguished technology and capability and performance, and that's the only thing you're changing, yeah. First of all, I'm sure we could be more cost-effective for one thing, but that's usually not enough to justify in those cases. If someone's unsure about that, it's because the foundation of the question is, I don't understand how this is different. I don't understand what I would stand to benefit from using something different and oftentimes, at that stage of the conversation, it's just hard to get that across. I think that they can be very distinctive. I think there can be very good reasons and there are important differences. Cory (34:01): What would you say you're favorite thing about B&R as a company is, or maybe like your favorite product? What's something that really gets you excited? David Nichols (34:09): What gets me excited about B&R is the pattern that... the stuff that we work with is really ahead of the industry and it's been that way for a really long time. If you want to see what a lot of big brands will be touting five years from now, you can just look at what B&R is doing right now. If you go back through the history, one example that I know that... it changes. It changes over time. A couple examples that come to mind are... this is before my time, but B&R came out with a digital network [servo 00:34:50] drive that was running on ethernet. No one was doing that. That was totally revolutionary. Now, if you look at that, of course, that's how everything works now. If you look at safety, if you look at the entire idea of having an integrated tool that combines a PLC and an HMI and a motion controller and a safety controller, that's something that a lot of companies nowadays will try to say that they have and maybe we can argue about... well, they're not quite doing it exactly right, but they say that now. David Nichols (35:24): There was a time 10 years ago where that was unheard of and you could go into a meeting and say, "Hey, see, it does all these things together. You don't have to spend all your engineering time just getting these four devices to coordinate with each other. You can actually make your machine... you can spend that time making your machine a better machine." That was amazing. Now, everybody talks about it that way and if you look at stuff that B&R is doing with track technology and some of these new concepts that they're coming up with, the hardest part of that actually is being on that cutting edge is a lot of times people will look at and say, "I don't get it." Say, "Well, just let it sink in for five years and then everybody will be talking about it." David Nichols (36:09): Then, again, bad on us maybe for not being able to help people see it sooner, but I know that if I keep working with B&R, I know that if I make an investment in the B&R platform, as I have founding a company and working with B&R for 15 years, that it's not just a one-off thing, hey I love this product. Well, a lot of people will have that product or that won't be such a big deal five or 10 years from now, but to work with a company that's constantly coming out with new technology that is revolutionary is really, really cool. David Nichols (36:46): If you're getting bored with what you have or you feel like competitors are catching up, well, just... there's probably something in the pipeline at B&R that's coming out next, that is going to be revolutionary as well and that's something that a lot of people that have worked at B&R for a long time really do appreciate and it's relevant to their machines, it comes from that collaboration with their clients and really responding to those needs. It's a big-picture thing, but that's what's really cool about it and you can go down this long timeline of revolutionary things that B&R does. That's because that's what's at their core, that's what the core of B&R is, is the ability to do that. That's really special. Cory (37:24): Talking about Loupe, then, what excites you about what you guys are doing right now and where you're headed in the future? David Nichols (37:31): What excited me about what we're doing now is that it doesn't... a lot of days it doesn't feel like work because it's like playing with toys. There are so many fun things to put together and new ideas to come up with and sometimes, your ideas turn out to be not that great after all, but there's so many possibilities to experiment with. The one's that make it through are the ones that do turn out to be really powerful. They end up helping the company grow; they end up making our company very successful. There's just many possibilities that it's just the harder part is just not getting too carried away or finding a way to build a company sustainably while doing that at the same time. To me, it's like, there's so much cool stuff to play with. I say play intentionally because it doesn't feel like work a lot of time. Cory (38:29): Something else that I noticed that you guys do a lot of is you have a really... I assume you have a really strong marketing team. I see your videos pop up on LinkedIn and I'm sure anybody who goes to take a look at you guys can really get a feel that branding and marketing is important to you. Why is that important and why is that such a part of your culture? David Nichols (38:53): Well, thank you and I said it earlier in the conversation that I feel like the core of our company has been that for a long time. What it's taken us more than decade to learn how to do is to have that, capture that, and have it look that way from the outside because if you go back in our history, we're excited about the same things, we had a lot of the same processes, a lot of the same ideas have been there for the longest time about how should you run your company, what's the right fit kind of customer, what are the cool opportunities? These are all things that have been steady, but we haven't been that good at expressing ourselves because we are engineers. We're people that make machines, we're not marketing people. We don't know how to capture that in a brand. David Nichols (39:43): In the last couple years, it was really a couple years ago where in trying to grow the company and, to be honest, in my opinion failing to really connect with people. We would go into a meeting and we might talk excitedly for an hour or two. Then, we would come out and people would say, "I have no idea what they were just talking about because they seem excited, but I don't get it." What I learned was, by collaborating with people who are marketing experts is there are ways... there's effective ways to collaborate with people who can help you put what you're excited about into words. Help you put what you're excited about into images, help you put what you're excited about into video. I've learned and I've stolen so many ideas from people who are good at those aspects and brought them into the company because we think what we're doing is really important, we're really excited about it, and we need to learn how to express it in all those ways. David Nichols (40:43): If we do that, if we're successful at that, then people who relate to that or people who are saying... people, our peers, or people who have a kinship on those kind of values, or whether that's a customer or a supplier or a potential employee, people that see that and relate to it and are also excited about it, are going to appear as if by magic. It's really, really cool when people say that. Again, I don't assume that what we do is going to be appealing to everybody. What's important to me is it's appealing to the people who we want to work with, the people who would be great customers for us, who we'd have great relationships with. Figuring out how to blast that out into the world is something that's been a key effort for the last couple of years. Cory (41:32): A question that some of the listeners may have. I know it's something that's been bouncing around in my head. What's inspired you to start your own company and what was that journey like? Do you have any advice for anybody out there in the automation world or otherwise that may be considering a similar path? David Nichols (41:52): I should put into context what happened that resulted in this company being started, which was I mentioned I worked for an automation distributor, another company, and now I work for this company. What happened there? What happened was that company was acquired. The owner of that company sold it to a larger company and anybody who's been involved in acquisitions knows the good and the bad and the drama that can result. I think I was 25 at the time, my co-founder, business partner still to this day, Karl Robrock, was I think 28, maybe 27. I would say two things I would give big credit to. One, having very little to lose. At that time, I was making what I was making as an application engineer and I figured, if I try this and it fails after a year, then I could probably take that experience and get a much better job than I ever had before because I would explain, "I tried to start a company and it failed and here's what I learned. Then, hey, guess what? That was a better education than I could have gotten from business school." David Nichols (43:03): Even though age is a factor, where are you in your life is a factor, I would say similarly, there can be an aspect of that whatever point in your life you are, which is I can experiment with this, I can try this, and the downside scenario, the worst case scenario is complete acceptable because, hey, I've kind of got nothing to lose. If you can engineer a way to make an experiment that you can run where if it doesn't work, no big deal, that's a good way to be because then if it keeps going, you're like, "Hey, cool. I can keep doing it." David Nichols (43:44): For the longest time I said, "We're successful because we're still a company." That was because we were balancing this, yeah, we only had so much income, but we just kept it small and we grew it over time. We didn't take any funding or any... well, I mean, with a couple friends and family kind of things, which would be typically. Again, point of privilege thanks to everybody who helped us in the beginning, but that's something were even now we do experiments in our company and the experiments that we run, they're not putting the company at risk, but the ones that work, are really powerful. The ones that break through, end up growing the company and being really, really important. David Nichols (44:26): Keeping the bets small enough to lose, is something that you can do over a long period of time. That's why 12 years into the company, I said for the longest time we were just taking over the world slowly because we were just as long as what we're doing, as long as we can keep making bets, as long as we can stay alive, then we can keep trying new things, making changes. Even, it's not always the same if you're right out of engineering school or you don't have kids or you don't have debt or you don't have any of these other things that are holding you back, but I'd say at any point, with regards to your situation, there can be an opportunity to say, what experiment could I run that I could tolerate losing? If you keep doing that, you can kind of stack things up from there. That's, if I had a business lesson, that would be it. Sometimes things really pay off and then you can grow faster. Great. Cory (45:24): Anything else you want to say about automation or about Loupe? Maybe plug the Loupe website where people can find out more about you guys? David Nichols (45:33): Absolutely. I'm very proud. I talked about some of these branding concepts in a high-level way. We just launched our new website. It's at Loupe.team, L-O-U-P-E dot T-E-A-M, and yes, team is a high-level domain. Team is what we are, so we're Loupe.Team. You can check out a lot of our media is there, our videos are there, you can see what our workspace is like, what our culture is like, our values. These are all things that we figured out how to talk about and we're really proud of sharing with the world. If it sounds interesting to you, we'd love to talk to you, collaborate with you whoever you are. LinkedIn is a really big thing for us, so follow us on LinkedIn, find me on LinkedIn. Again, my name is David Nichols. Send me a LinkedIn invite and, if you don't know me, then you send me a LinkedIn invite, then we will know each other, and I will accept it. I look forward to meeting anybody who is interested in collaborating with that. Cory (46:30): Awesome. Well, thanks David. I really appreciate you taking some time to chat with me and I'm sure this will be a valuable conversation for people to listen into. David Nichols (46:42): Likewise. Thank you very much, Cory. It's been a lot of fun. Cory (46:44): In future episodes, we're going to be diving into more exciting topics and common questions in automation. Coming up, we've got some episodes on machine vision, a special episode on robotics, a couple other exciting things coming down the pipeline, more special guests, special topics, etcetera. You want to make sure that you keep an eye out for those by subscribing to the podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen to your podcasts and if you enjoy the podcast, let us know by either sending David a LinkedIn message or leaving a review and a comment on Apple Podcast. If you want to get in touch with me, have an idea for the show, or just want to chat, you can get in touch with me on LinkedIn or email me at AutomationPodcast@gmail.com. Make sure you check out the B&R website and YouTube channel by searching B&R Automation and, of course, check out the guys at Loupe as well. They have some great content. Thanks for listening and we'll see you next time on This is Automation.
- [Treat Yourself](https://loupe.team/video/treat-yourself/) - A proper toolset contains a wide variety of different gear. German screwdrivers, B&R servo motors, and the occasional candle and bath set.
- [Live at Loupe S2E1](https://loupe.team/video/live-at-loupe-s2e1/) - Welcome back to Live at Loupe, our YouTube livestream series featuring real-time development of revolutionary machine concepts and technologies. Last week, we kicked off our second season virtually with some new and returning faces. Season One put our New Machine Concept process to the test, turning our back-of-the-napkin sketch into a prototype-worthy design plan known as the Trak Packer. This season, our goal is to turn our concept to a complete digital twin in a 6 week sprint. After a quick briefing, David Blackburn started shaping the scope of season two and prioritizing what’s achievable in six weeks’ time. The team discussed what software to use, who the target audience would be, and how to show and distribute a self contained package using an ABB Robot Virtual Controller (without the user having to download RobotStudio). After reviewing key decisions, the team disbanded, each with their own threads to follow in prep for the next meeting. Jonathan is investigating if it’s possible to have ABB’s virtual controller operate as a standalone solution. Josh is checking out the interfacing between threejs and ABB, and David B. is finalizing the scope for the season.
- [Bunker Upgrade](https://loupe.team/video/bunker-upgrade/) - This hardware was so blindingly stunning out of the box that we nearly forgot to mention that it’s a C50 Panel 4PPC50.156B-10B from our friends at B&R Industrial Automation.
- [Virtual Welcome Wagon](https://loupe.team/video/virtual-welcome-wagon/) - Loupe welcomes people, even when they can’t make it to the office. We’re pleased to introduce Brian, our newest member to the team. No greeting would be complete without some custom swag.
- [Live at Loupe Recap - Week 4](https://loupe.team/video/live-at-loupe-recap-week-4/) - We wrapped up season one of Live at Loupe last week, and put the finishing touches on our pitch presentation. What initially started as a back-of-the-napkin sketch is now a fleshed out prototype-worthy design plan. Through the course of our six week sprint, we’ve managed to determine the correct track layout, explore iterative CAD designs, and review the timing studies and controls architecture of our revolutionary New Machine Concept. This process not only clarified objectives and expectations, but allowed us to workshop potential risks and solutions in an intentional and dedicated manner. We’re gearing up to hit the ground running for season two and planning our next development sprints. We’re excited to share our collaborative efforts with the world again very soon. To see what we’ve accomplished so far, be sure to check out our YouTube channel. Stay tuned for season two!
- [Live at Loupe Recap - Week 1](https://loupe.team/video/welcome-to-live-at-loupe/) - Welcome to ‘Live at Loupe,’ our YouTube livestream series featuring real-time development of revolutionary machine concepts and technologies. Tune in while our New Machine Concept team transforms a ‘cocktail napkin sketch’ into a prototype-worthy design plan and system architecture. This new machine will be able to case pack a wide variety of product inputs without any changeovers in hard tooling, thanks to new technologies from B&R Industrial Automation (ACOPOStrak) and ABB Robotics. We kicked off with ACOPOStrak expert Derrick Stacey from B&R and used our first few meetings to dig in and get clear about just what we’re trying to accomplish here and why. Join us Tuesdays and Thursdays to see our core values at work: Revolutionary Improvement, Trust in Collaboration, Explore and Discover, and Think Critically.
- [Live at Loupe S1E5](https://loupe.team/video/live-at-loupe-s1e5/) - [0:48] Intro/season 1 mission [1:55] Original CAD model review, interference point [5:30] Pros to New Machine Concept [14:03] Pitch deck explanation [15:04] Jonathan presents pitch deck (pitch deck review) [21:39] Discussion around 'why do anything?' [23:48] The 'solution' [25:26] Divert loop discussion [27:14] Donut break [32:52] Robot tooling/infeed system discussion [35:13] Controls architecture [36:38] 'Power supplies are great' [38:20] Relative cost component [41:10] What's left to do? (next steps)
- [Live at Loupe S1E4](https://loupe.team/video/live-at-loupe-s1e4/) - [0:56] Mission of season/episode [1:37] Audio choppy (skip to 7:55 for clear audio) [7:55] Jonathan explains his graph [10:19] Shuttle layout CAD concept [13:55] Nathan annotates infeed & robot [17:43] Donut break [19:45] Nathan's control architecture [29:47] Next steps
- [Live at Loupe S1E3](https://loupe.team/video/live-at-loupe-s1e3/) - [0:46] What we are doing anyway? [1:35] Meeting agenda [2:09] Nathan presents infeed system [5:46] Live demo + follow up questions [15:57] Where are the donuts? [21:50] Jonathan presents timing studies [29:26] Acceleration/deceleration rates [31:44] Follow up items [33:34] Wrap up
- [Live at Loupe S1E2](https://loupe.team/video/live-at-loupe-s1e2/) - [0:03] We're Live at Loupe! [0:40] Meeting agenda [0:50] What is Live at Loupe? [1:27] Week 1 recap [6:30] 'Why?' Track inspirations [10:29] Briefing follow up [18:29] Timing studies [23:57] Risk factors [25:18] Potential prototypes [33:05] Important things to consider [36:39] Next steps
- [Live at Loupe S1E1](https://loupe.team/video/live-at-loupe-s1e1/) - [0:03] Discovery meeting intro [1:33] Machine Concept deck presentation [10:26] Follow up discussion [17:39] What happens when things don't go right? [21:00] Dynamics of product handling [24:56] Track scaling and logistics [30:15] Robot and end effector tooling [36:08] Product infeed and sensing [42:30] Wrap up
- [This Is Fine](https://loupe.team/video/this-is-fine/) - Unboxing doesn’t need to stop at the office. In fact, we’re ramping up our deliveries. Thanks for kicking off our virtual leg of the series Jeff!
- [Live at Loupe Recap - Week 3](https://loupe.team/video/live-at-loupe-recap-week-3/) - We’re wrapping things up bringing in season one of Live at Loupe for a (hopefully) smooth landing. This week, Jonathan and Nathan brought results from timing studies to determine the right layout, took us on a tour of the design in CAD, and outlined the controls architecture that would bring it all together. Join us Tuesday February 25th (10am PST) as we put the finishing touches on our New Machine Concept for season one and plot out our efforts for season two.
- [Live at Loupe Recap - Week 2](https://loupe.team/video/live-at-loupe-recap-week-2/) - We recently kicked off our new livestream series, Live at Loupe, where our New Machine Concept team is setting out to turn revolutionary ideas into workable blueprints. This season, we’re designing a new packaging machine that can handle a wide variety of product inputs without any changeovers in hard tooling. During last week’s discovery meeting, we clarified objectives and expectations for season one, and asked Nathan and Jonathan to follow up on some threads related to infeed mechanisms and timing studies. With only a few days between meetings, Nathan and Jonathan workshopped potential solutions for track layout and perceived risks. Nathan explored how to eliminate (or reduce) unconstrained movement of an object when it enters a shuttle. Jonathan worked on tuning the balance between infeed speed, number of shuttles, and track length of the track to hit the highest case output while leaving some wiggle room for process delays or other interruptions. Tune in this Tuesday (10am PST) when we’ll be finishing our track cell layout and setting the plan for our next development sprints.
- [Industrial Aesthetics](https://loupe.team/video/industrial-aesthetics/) - The beauty in Alastair’s photography is not unexpected to us. Machines built to do a job are beautiful in and of themselves.
- [Safe UDP](https://loupe.team/video/safe-udp/) - What are we wrenching on: Nathan is transferring safety system signals over a standard Ethernet UDP network. Why it’s revolutionary: Using existing Ethernet instead of hard wires or discrete field buses allows for wireless transmission and can reduce the wire count in slip ring applications.
- [Light Curtain](https://loupe.team/video/light-curtain/) - What we’re wrenching on: The SG4 safety light curtain from DataLogic Why it's revolutionary: All you need to integrate to a machine safety system is Ethernet Powerlink and 24V power. All safety signals are available over the network, including the realtime status of individual beams! This data opens up all kinds of revolutionary possibilities for process improvement and operator experience.
- [WebHMI Demo](https://loupe.team/video/webhmi-demo/) - What we’re wrenching on: With Loupe’s webHMI it’s dead simple to use HTML, CSS, and Javascript in user interfaces to industrial machines. Why it’s revolutionary: It looks better, it works better, and it’s better to develop and build interfaces using these tools.
- [Let's Play Nice](https://loupe.team/video/lets-play-nice/) - Fieldbus wars are so 15 years ago. Can’t we all admit that there are pros and cons and specs games all around? And besides, these can all play nicely together, so why not mix and match when the machine architecture can benefit from that?
- [Cheers to Vitality](https://loupe.team/video/cheers-to-vitality/) - It’s rough out there this time of year. Keep your body healthy and safe. Engineer Your Lifestyle.
- [More Robots, More Lasers](https://loupe.team/video/more-robots-more-lasers/) - Is there anything that lasers can’t do? These keep operators safe while reporting the distance they see in every direction via Ethernet, a huge bonus for flexible collaborative machines and cells.
- [Coiling Cables](https://loupe.team/video/coiling-cables/) - Proper coiling techniques are important if you want to keep your cables from getting twisted, or you need a good laugh.
- [No Bad Bosses](https://loupe.team/video/no-bad-bosses/) - If only it were so easy to see the difference between a good and bad boss.
- [Piper Explained](https://loupe.team/video/piper-explained/) - You’ve certainly heard of PackML, which is killer. But if all of your machine state sequencing ends up piled into a gigantic monolith, get ready to have your mind blown. There’s a better way to structure that and it’s called Piper.
- [Tiny Powerhouses](https://loupe.team/video/tiny-powerhouses/) - If you’re one of the people that didn’t know that B&R not only makes PLCs, but makes some of the best PLCs in the world, please inquire within.
- [Coordinate Frame Currency](https://loupe.team/video/coordinate-frame-currency/) - Money can buy happiness, at least in this case. Switzerland knows the way to our heart. We love a country that appreciates a well formed coordinate frame.
- [Welcome Home](https://loupe.team/video/welcome-home/) - “Is it really our job to just buy these toys?” YES IT IS! 1365 kg of fun.
- [A Very Merry Unboxing](https://loupe.team/video/a-very-merry-unboxing/) - Just in time for our holiday party, this magical present arrived at the office. Like kids on Christmas - we could hardly wait.
- [Best of 2019](https://loupe.team/video/best-of-2019/) - What a year — thanks for keeping things interesting, 2019! Can’t wait to see what 2020 brings us.
- [Robots Without Borders](https://loupe.team/video/robots-without-borders/) - Take the penny tour of a robot that lives side by side with its programmers in harmony and safety. Tear down the cages! Any robot can be collaborative when wrapped in the appropriate safety monitoring equipment and intelligent safety controls.
- [Knives Out](https://loupe.team/video/knives-out/) - Unboxing wouldn’t be the same without our trusted Kershaw. Another year full of flicks to come.
- [Economical Prototypes](https://loupe.team/video/economical-prototypes/) - No excuses for not making that cardboard spaceship now. Go forth and prototype!
- [Drawing Machine](https://loupe.team/video/drawing-machine/) - Check out this new addition to our growing collection of computer and machine based artwork, courtesy of James Gandy.
- [Show me the Gimbal](https://loupe.team/video/show-me-the-gimbal/) - Upgrading our video gear one spontaneous Apple purchase at a time.
- [Commuter Essentials](https://loupe.team/video/commuter-essentials/) - Amassing crucial tools for our ever growing bike fleet. Need a top off? Stop by.
- [Respect Your Elders](https://loupe.team/video/x20cs1020-unbox/) - Respect your elders — and speak to their devices via serial RS-232. Drop one of these slices wherever old-school transmissions are still needed.
- [A Lesson in OSHA Compliance](https://loupe.team/video/a-lesson-in-osha-compliance/) - Maintain OSHA compliance and avoid horror movie scenes in your shop with finger safe blowers.
- [Sound of Silence](https://loupe.team/video/sound-of-silence/) - TFW you can hear your keyboard over your air compressor.
- [Under Pressure](https://loupe.team/video/under-pressure/) - Not just any air hose - a really good one (Siri agrees). The phonetically enjoyable sounds we can make now are endless.
- [Sound On](https://loupe.team/video/sound-on/) - When you spend 4+ hours per day in Zoom meetings, quality of life (and sound) is critical. Check out our favorite gear, which we’ve sent as gifts to collaborators.
- [Next Stop, Palm Springs](https://loupe.team/video/next-stop-palm-springs/) - A magical desert getaway for the whole crew is set for January 23-25. Choose your own adventure: Sit at the pool all day? Get lost in Joshua Tree? Take in an architecture tour? Anything could happen...
- [Punch a Bunch of Plastic](https://loupe.team/video/punch-a-bunch-of-plastic/) - Delayed Halloween unboxing: a frightening tale of breaking your CNC router bits when running into metal screws.
- [Collect Them All](https://loupe.team/video/collect-them-all/) - Some people collect beanie babies. We collect axis helpers. Here we share the latest addition, from our friends at Heidenhain.
- [Two Brains Are Better Than One](https://loupe.team/video/two-brains-are-better-than-one/) - Thanks to New Machine Concept Engineer Jonathan for this detailed explanation of how to fuse two safe brains: SafeMove Pro on IRC5 and B&R Integrated Safety controllers.
- [Always Wear Your Goggles](https://loupe.team/video/always-wear-your-goggles/) - Building robots virtually in simulators is great. Jumping inside the simulator to take a look around is next level. Goggles ON.
- [Need For Speed](https://loupe.team/video/need-for-speed/) - Moving at blurry speeds is powerful. Moving at speed while electronically diverting between tracks is a game changer. Process flow upgrades incoming.
- [Non-Secret Award for Super Secret Activities](https://loupe.team/video/non-secret-award-for-super-secret-activities/) - Looking forward to one day publicly explaining why we received this.
- [M10 Countersink](https://loupe.team/video/m10-countersink/) - Drink lots of water, get plenty of sleep, and buy nice fasteners.
- [Fancy Bracket](https://loupe.team/video/fancy-bracket/) - 90% of engineering is building brackets to connect to other brackets. Here’s a really nice bracket from the camera and film industry, where for some reason black anodized aluminum machined parts include a 5X markup.
- [Loupe Visits The Lone Star](https://loupe.team/video/loupe-visits-the-lone-star/) - Back in January, our whole team assembled in Austin for Superhuddle 2019. After a solid 45 minutes of PowerPoint, the team really let loose. Thanks Austin!
- [Check Us Out](https://loupe.team/video/new-website/) - We're excited to reveal our new website. It more accurately reflects who we are and what we do. Imagine the power of a closer look.
- [ACOPOStrak](https://loupe.team/video/acopostrak/) - It’s hard to believe this video isn’t sped up. We’re scratching our heads wondering who would want a machine this fast. Maybe we should slow it down so as not to scare people?
- [YUMI Can Move](https://loupe.team/video/yumi-can-move/) - Our ABB Yumi's got the moves - strike a pose.
- [B&R Panel PC 3100](https://loupe.team/video/the-br-panel-pc-3100/) - Karl loves B&R PCs.
- [Safe Brains](https://loupe.team/video/safe-brains/) - All new kinds of collaborative concepts can be brought to production when robotic and conventional safety systems can coordinate in such a fast and articulate way.
- [Plug it In](https://loupe.team/video/sdl4-unbox/) - This week's unboxing is brought to you by B&R. Stay tuned for the install.
- [Nervous System](https://loupe.team/video/nervous-system-mugs-unbox/) - An upgrade to your coffee drinking experience.
- [Spektra Cutters](https://loupe.team/video/spektra-cutters-unbox/) - We’re constantly receiving packages at the office - practical to totally random. Stay tuned to see what we unbox each week!
- [Tools for the Job](https://loupe.team/video/macbook-pro-unbox/) - Great engineers deserve great tools to do great work. These are the best you can get.
- [Flick](https://loupe.team/video/kershaw-unbox/) - We have our special guest Shawn joining us this week. Let’s see what we unbox!
- [XV Module](https://loupe.team/video/xv-module-unbox-2/) - Our friend and colleague Shaun brought us something to unbox this week. Let’s see what’s inside!
- [Hybrid Cable](https://loupe.team/video/hybrid-cable-unbox/) - Curious as to what we're unboxing this week? Hint: it's orange.
- [Ten Characteristics of a Good Name](https://loupe.team/video/loupe-unbox/) - We're unboxing some important information - stay tuned!
- [Prepared Pencils & Wiha Drivers](https://loupe.team/video/prepared-pencils-wiha-drivers-unbox/) - We’ve got a double unboxing this week. Also, shout out to Spencer Wright and ‘The Prepared’ for the awesome thank you gift!
- [LSA Motor Talk](https://loupe.team/video/lsa-motor-unbox/) - Come for enthusiastic motor talk, stay for stereotypes on international manufacturing.
- [ACOPOS P3](https://loupe.team/video/acopos-p3-unbox/) - We’re very excited about this new servo drive from B&R. It’s high performance and incredibly compact!
- [Robot Trailer Loadout](https://loupe.team/video/loupe-robot-trailer-loadout/) - When your robot RSVPs to a party..
- [Camera Sensor](https://loupe.team/video/camera-sensor-unbox/) - Good things come in small packages. Who knew a depth camera for a robot could be so adorable?
- [MISUMI Gears](https://loupe.team/video/misumi-unbox/) - We’re unboxing some greasy gears from Misumi this week. Excellent for our three motor test setup - let’s whip some chains around!
- [Work Toys](https://loupe.team/video/gamevice-unbox/) - Fun fact: children’s toys have the ability to work better than most industrial products.
- [Current Transformer](https://loupe.team/video/current-transformer-unbox/) - When you really need to know what’s going on with the power in your cabinets, get yourself some current transformers.
- [The Magic of Powerstrips](https://loupe.team/video/powerstrip-unbox/) - Unboxing blooper! Sometimes you just have to roll with it..
- [It's Here](https://loupe.team/video/irb4600-unbox/) - This week’s delivery doesn’t fit on the coffee table. In fact, it requires a forklift to move it. Welcome home IRB4600!
- [Brains of the Bot](https://loupe.team/video/irc5-unbox/) - We’re featuring a double unbox this week because every robot deserves a brain!
- [ABB FlexPendant](https://loupe.team/video/abb-flexpendant-unbox/) - Unboxing our ABB robot FlexPendant. Can’t wait to power this up on our new IRC5 robot controller!
- [Loupe Swag](https://loupe.team/video/loupe-swag-unbox/) - If you need swag, we’ve got you covered. Check out our store to get your very own swag bag! https://loupe.store
- [Wiha for the Win](https://loupe.team/video/wiha-unbox/) - The only bit set you'll ever need. Shout out to Wiha for this magnificent creation!
- [Enabling Switch](https://loupe.team/video/enabling-switch-unbox/) - This week’s unbox is brought to you by our special guest Jason at Bulwark Safety Systems. Enabling switches are extremely important if you work closely with robots and want to be safe.
- [Bolt Cutters](https://loupe.team/video/bolt-cutters-unbox/) - Following Werner Herzog’s sage advice: carry bolt cutters everywhere.
- [Axis Helpers](https://loupe.team/video/axis-helpers-unbox/) - These CNC’ed axis helpers help us visualize which direction is which. RGB = XYZ!
- [PROFINET IO](https://loupe.team/video/profinet-io-unbox/) - Our new IRB4600 robot comes with a ProfiNet master on-board. B&R makes some fantastic IO and safety systems that can directly connect to ProfiNet systems. For safety or IO systems of any complexity, it’s a huge advantage in terms of speed and data volumes to be able to talk via networks instead of discrete wires.
- [Gunderson Swag](https://loupe.team/video/gunderson-swag-unbox/) - We’re not the only company excited about core values and enamel pins! If you’re not already, go work for a company that knows what they stand for and demonstrates that in their day to day behavior (and swag, of course).
- [Made the Hard Way](https://loupe.team/video/grovemade-unbox/) - The intersection of organization and beauty - crucial elements in our workspace. Thanks Ken for these functional and visually stunning pieces!
- [Trust in Collaboration](https://loupe.team/video/anniversary-unbox/) - Working alongside like-minded companies makes all the difference. Cheers to Kinesis for a revolutionary year in collaboration!
- [Small Servo Motor](https://loupe.team/video/8lsa2-unbox/) - Continuing our “servo motors in 2019 are awesome” series: A compact, single cable motor with a 60mm flange size. These are perfect for tricky fixturing and adjustment axes on larger machines and work cells.
- [Which Way Is Up?](https://loupe.team/video/which-way-is-up/) - Our axis helpers are now available in two-dimensional sticker form. Which way points up when you apply them is up to you.
- [Which Way Is Up?](https://loupe.team/video/axis-helper-stickers-unbox/) - Our axis helpers are now available in two-dimensional sticker form. Which way points up when you apply them is up to you.
- [Goldilocks of PCs](https://loupe.team/video/apc3100-unbox/) - Some industrial PCs are small but weak. Some PCs are powerful but bulky. This one is just right!
- [Safety First](https://loupe.team/video/technology-guard-unbox/) - Tiny but mighty! These B&R Technology Guards are crucial when it comes to protecting your IP.
- [IRC5 Cover](https://loupe.team/video/irc5-cover-unbox/) - Unbox excitement is spreading worldwide. Thanks to Alessandro at Drim Robotics for sending us this awesome gear all the way from Poland!
- [Know Your Environment](https://loupe.team/video/x20cmr111-unbox/) - This B&R Industrial Automation IO slice is like a tiny weather station that lives inside your control cabinet. It reports temperature, humidity, even acceleration and rotation speeds. Know your environment.
- [Wera Tool Check](https://loupe.team/video/wera-tool-check-unbox/) - Thanks to The Prepared for pointing out an even more amazing set of German hand tools that we could not resist adding to our field kit.
- [International Swag](https://loupe.team/video/international-swag/) - The swag is never-ending these days. Thanks B&R Denmark for the fantastic gear (and sugar rush).
- [Swanson Coffeebot Test](https://loupe.team/video/swanson-coffeebot-test/) - What we’re wrenching on: Testing out the camera robot on one of our favorite subjects: coffee Why it’s revolutionary: User interfaces for robotics could benefit from current technology in smartphones and video games. 3000 lbs moving gracefully with a slight push of the thumb.
- [Robot End Effector](https://loupe.team/video/robot-end-effector/) - What we’re wrenching on: We added an RS-232 communication slice to the end effector IO block on our IRB 4600 robot. Why it’s revolutionary: With just a single Ethernet Powerlink cable running to the end effector, we can talk with smart devices built into the tooling. Keep your ASCII tables handy.
- [Right Hand Rule](https://loupe.team/video/right-hand-rule/) - The axis helper you carry with you, now available as a t-shirt.
- [Afternoon CNC](https://loupe.team/video/afternoon-cnc/) - Company logo cutting.
- [New Space](https://loupe.team/video/new-space/) - We've had a few homes over the years.
- [The CNC Desks](https://loupe.team/video/the-cnc-desks/) - DIY desk-building.
- [WOAH](https://loupe.team/video/woah/) - When it moves faster than expected.
- [The New Crimper](https://loupe.team/video/the-new-crimper/) - It's important to have the right tools for the job.
- [NJ220 Rigging](https://loupe.team/video/nj220-rigging/) - Bolt it down and plug it in.
- [The Mural](https://loupe.team/video/the-mural/) - Engineer your lifestyle.
- [It Moves](https://loupe.team/video/it-moves/)
- [The Robot Delivery](https://loupe.team/video/the-robot-delivery/) - It's HERE!!!
- [The Slab](https://loupe.team/video/the-slab/) - The Slab before the Robot.
- [ACOPOStrak at IMTS 2018](https://loupe.team/video/acopostrak-at-imts-2018/) - Revolutionary new transport technology from B&R Industrial Automation: https://br-automation.com/en/products/versatile-transport-systems/acopostrak/ Presented by Loupe: https://loupe.team/ Photography, Video, Editing by David Nichols: https://www.linkedin.com/in/david-nichols-b677535/ Music by Unicorn Heads: http://www.unicornheads.com
- [Grand Opening](https://loupe.team/video/grand-opening/) - Celebrating our new space and 10+ years as a company.
- [Virtual Holiday Party 2018](https://loupe.team/video/virtual-holiday-party-2018/) - Semi-remote team = semi-remote holiday party
- [B&R openRobotics iPad Jogging](https://loupe.team/video/br-openrobotics-ipad-jogging/) - Turning toys into super-weapons on the daily.
- [Automation Panel Unwrap](https://loupe.team/video/automation-panel-unwrap/) - The satisfying sounds of unwrapping an Automation Panel 5000.
- [Swingarm Install](https://loupe.team/video/swingarm-install/) - This video would be shorter if they had read the instructions.
- [Test Drive](https://loupe.team/video/test-drive/) - Taking the robot for a test drive with our new iPad HMI.
- [PPC3100](https://loupe.team/video/ppc3100/) - One of the many things you can do with a CNC machine: make a mount for your PPC3100.
- [Telepresence](https://loupe.team/video/telepresence/) - Revolutionary improvement
- [Remote Commissioning](https://loupe.team/video/remote-commissioning/) - Who says you need to be in the same state as the machine you’re working on?
- [SDL4 Retrofit](https://loupe.team/video/sdl4-retrofit/) - Here's Nathan revolutionizing our display interface with SDL4.
- [Collision Detection](https://loupe.team/video/collision-detection/) - What we’re wrenching on: Josh developed a real-time collision detection feature that uses 3D models. Why it’s revolutionary: Running in real-time allows us to be flexible and move really close to objects that have complex shapes.
- [Offline Robot Processes](https://loupe.team/video/offline-robot-processes/) - What we’re wrenching on: Teaching robot processes offline reliably requires great software tools. Why it’s revolutionary: When we can rely on our simulators to match reality, we can build 95% of our software before we have any physical installations to work with, and test integrations to our other software systems right on our laptops.
- [Swanson Studio Collaboration](https://loupe.team/video/swanson-studio-collaboration/) - What we’re wrenching on: We’re developing new interface technologies for robotics that let us act as a skilled operator. Why it’s revolutionary: Robot and software interfaces should be welcoming and natural for new operators. We take technology from smartphones and video games and put them to new uses.
- [Loupe Vinyl](https://loupe.team/video/loupe-vinyl/) - Putting our touch on the new ABB robot.
- [ABB YUMI](https://loupe.team/video/abb-yumi/) - ABB’s YUMI can easily be programmed to perform complex tasks with operators in close proximity.
- [Ding Ding Ding](https://loupe.team/video/ding-ding-ding/) - Did you know that the brain can respond to audio 40 milliseconds faster than visuals? Ding ding ding!
- [Robot Weightlifting](https://loupe.team/video/robot-weightlifting/) - It’s hard to imagine this equipment can lift such a heavy robot. Stay tuned to see where it’s going.
- [Three.js](https://loupe.team/video/three-js/) - What we’re wrenching on: Three.js is an open source 3D graphics library that lets us build custom scenes showing live updates from our robots and controllers. Why it’s revolutionary: Technology from the world of video games and web browsers allows us to create richer experiences for the users and operators. It also lets us show our values mural in the 3D HMI.
- [IRB4600 Install](https://loupe.team/video/irb4600-install/) - Very excited to have our new robot up and running. This beast can move!
- [Custom TG](https://loupe.team/video/custom-tg/) - What we’re wrenching on: These USB keys protect machine software from unauthorized duplication. Why it’s revolutionary: As software becomes a bigger part of the IP behind machines and automation components, it’s critical for OEMs to protect it. New machine features can also be unlocked in the field via this mechanism.

## Stories

- [Ship in Six: How Does It All Work?](https://loupe.team/story/ship-in-six-how-does-it-all-work/) - As a software development consultancy, our approach is structured around iterative six-week sprints — designed to account for the inevitable unknown. But how does that process actually take shape? Learn how we chart a course through uncharted territory.
- [Trak Packer: A New Machine Concept](https://loupe.team/story/trak-packer/) - Our revolutionary YouTube livestream series just completed its first season — following our team as we create a New Machine Concept for the Trak Packer.
- [See Spot Revolutionize](https://loupe.team/story/see-spot-revolutionize/) - Loupe is excited to announce that we are now a proud Boston Dynamics partner and will be adding Spot to our suite of industry-leading hardware products!
- [Introducing Shuv: Automating Automation](https://loupe.team/story/introducing-shuv/) - Loupe is proud to announce our newest product, Shuv — which enables you to push updates automatically to any system, from anywhere, with components that all live remotely. It's CI/CD for PLCs, available now.
- [Greengrass: The Quiet Hero of AWS](https://loupe.team/story/greengrass/) - Amazon recently made Greengrass fully open source, introducing a world of new capabilities for AWS users. Learn more about why Loupe is so excited about this revolutionary technology.
- [The Unified Theory of Loupe](https://loupe.team/story/unified-theory-of-loupe/) - Being Loupe is about more than running a business. In fact, we believe the business comes second and creativity comes first. Learn more about our revolutionary model.
- [Software Engineering for PLCs](https://loupe.team/story/software-engineering-plcs/) - There’s a big divide on how people think about developing systems controlled by PLCs. We propose that a more modern software engineering approach is in order. Find out why.
- [The Secret Weapon Powering Elon Musk’s Revolutionary New Battery Factory](https://loupe.team/story/the-secret-weapon-powering-elon-musks-revolutionary-new-battery-factory/) - At this year’s Tesla Battery Day, Elon Musk announced a novel automation production system. Hear from our CEO and Co-Founder David Nichols as he unveils the technology behind this revolution, and the familiar process they took to get there.
- [Integrated Automation and Robotics from B&R and ABB](https://loupe.team/story/integrated-automation-and-robotics-from-br-and-abb/) - There are a number of interesting ways to connect B&R controls with ABB Robotics, and opportunities made possible by their compatibility.
- [Trak Packer: Our First Six-Week Sprint](https://loupe.team/story/trak-packer-sprint/) - Follow the Loupe team as we take the New Machine Concept for our revolutionary Trak Packer and turn it into a shippable product.
- [Ship in Six](https://loupe.team/story/ship-in-six/) - When it comes to product development, it’s no secret that the only certainty is uncertainty, and change the only constant. Rather than shying away from this fundamental truth, in our years working in automation we’ve found a way to embrace it. We call it Ship in Six.
- [New Machine Concept](https://loupe.team/story/new-machine-concept/) - If you’re anything like us, you’ve probably had a new machine idea rattling around in a mental drawer for a while now.

## Case Studies

- [Blending Art and Engineering for Las Vegas’ Grandest Stage](https://loupe.team/case-study/blending-art-and-engineering-for-las-vegas-grandest-stage/) - Learn how we partnered with Michael Curry Design to create a massive animatronic phoenix for Awakening at Wynn Las Vegas, blending artistry and engineering to deliver flawless, awe-inspiring performances night after night.
- [Precision Packaging on a Budget](https://loupe.team/case-study/precision-packaging-on-a-budget/) - We partnered with a leading packaging machinery company to streamline motion systems, reducing costs by 40% while maintaining precision and reliability.
- [Revolutionizing Renewable Energy with Airborne Wind Turbines](https://loupe.team/case-study/revolutionizing-renewable-energy-with-airborne-wind-turbines/) - The Makani airborne wind turbine pushed the limits of renewable energy — and ground operations. Discover how Ship in Six engineered an advanced ground station with precision winch control and synchronized motion systems, ensuring stability and success in extreme environments.
- [Next-Gen Wafer Processing](https://loupe.team/case-study/next-gen-wafer-processing/) - Our client’s newest wafer design didn’t fit the mold — literally. Learn how Ship in Six developed a custom robotic solution with advanced motion control, enhancing efficiency and accelerating their time to market.
- [Additive Production at Scale](https://loupe.team/case-study/additive-production-at-scale/) - In this Ship in Six case study, learn how we helped an additive manufacturing company scale up their platform from 10 machines to hundreds — delivering a full-stack manufacturing solution at unprecedented speed, precision, quality, and scale.
- [Pushing the Limits of Carbon Fiber Technology](https://loupe.team/case-study/pushing-the-limits-of-carbon-fiber-technology/) - In this Ship in Six case study, learn how we helped Fives Machining Systems develop a groundbreaking carbon fiber printer — achieving unprecedented precision and speed in aerospace manufacturing through advanced software and hardware integration.
- [A High-Stakes Prototype in Construction Automation](https://loupe.team/case-study/a-high-stakes-prototype-in-construction-automation/) - When a venture-backed startup needed to advance their construction technology, they turned to Ship in Six. Learn how we transformed a rough concept into a sophisticated prototype.

## Video Categories

- [Unbox](https://loupe.team/videos/unbox/) - We unbox things every week to share what’s inspiring us. See the latest technology we’re excited to use, or what values-driven partners are sending our way to support the revolution.
- [Revolutionary Improvement](https://loupe.team/videos/revolutionary-improvement/) - We want to share our breakthroughs and favorite innovations with the world. See how our work unfolds to take machines to the next level.
- [Test Drive](https://loupe.team/videos/test-drive/) - Demos can be an efficient and compelling way to motivate the move from concept to prototype. Watch us solve the first critical problems to validate viable proofs of concept and uncover paths forward.
- [Explore & Discover](https://loupe.team/videos/explore-and-discover/) - Unstructured experimentation is an integral part of the way we work. Join us as we try the unfamiliar and flex our creative muscles to foster new ways of learning, collaborating and growing as a team.
- [Live at Loupe](https://loupe.team/videos/live-at-loupe/) - This YouTube livestream series features the real-time development of our machines and technologies. Get a behind-the-scenes look at how we solve complex puzzles every day.

## Categories

- [Inspiration](https://loupe.team/stories/inspiration/)
- [Methodology](https://loupe.team/stories/methodology/)
- [Collaborations](https://loupe.team/stories/collaborations/)