This engineer built a functioning Remy from Ratatouille
CBC
As Christina Ernst prepared her Halloween costume for this year, she drew on her engineering knowledge, and the classic animated movie Ratatouille.
Her creation received more than nine million views in less than a week, thanks in part to a repost from one of the film's actors.
"I think it's something that just brings a lot of joy and whimsy to people to see these really over-engineered projects. So I'm glad so many people like that," Ernst told As It Happens guest host Peter Armstrong.
Ernst, the Chicago Public Library's fall maker-in-residence, designed a functioning version of the rodent from the 2007 Pixar classic. In the film, a rat named Remy, who dreams of becoming a cook in Paris, teams up with a restaurant's garbage boy, Alfredo Linguini.
"They find out that if Remy pulls on this human's hair, kind of like a marionette, that he can control the human's cooking," said Ernst. Remy controls Alfredo's cooking and movements, and the two work together to create culinary masterpieces.
Ernst's design mimics this, with the help of computer programming, motors and artistic flair.
Ernst made a headband and then attached it to a 3D-printed rat figurine that sits on top of her head. Inside the rat, Ernst added some tiny motors, and a very tiny computer to make the rat's arms move.
"When it's put inside of the rat design that's sitting on my head, it looks less like a jumble of wires and more like an actual rat is pulling my hair," said Ernst.
When she first posted her invention last week, the robot's arms would move randomly. But when she posted the video on TikTok, people had a suggestion for her. They suggested the rat's arms move in sync with hers.
"And I thought, I actually think I can do this with another tiny computer chip called an accelerometer," said Ernst.
She posted a new video only two days later, showing the updated Remy that, with the help of the accelerometer and some wiring running up her sleeves, can now move its arms in sync with her own.
The video has been shared all over social media, and even made its way to the actor who voiced Remy in Ratatouille.
"Oh my God WOW are you KIDDING me," Patton Oswalt posted on X, formerly known as Twitter, in reaction to Ernst's video.
It's not the first creation Ernst has made and shared on her TikTok account @shebuildsrobots.
