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Stage 3 · Advanced → Research-grade

Embodied AI & Sim-to-Real

The frontier of embodied AI on a real humanoid. Build and calibrate simulations, train AI policies with RL and imitation, and close the sim-to-real gap to deploy on FF Master.

  • FF Master
  • 2 Levels
  • 11 Themes
  • Advanced → Research-grade
➊ Build and calibrate physics simulations
➋ Train policies with RL and imitation
➌ Run a full data-factory loop
➍ Deploy a trained policy to the real humanoid
FF Master humanoid

Levels in this stage

How the stage is staged — each level builds on the one before it.

L8

Humanoid control

The 19-DOF upper body under your code — IK, impedance, ROS 2 and gantry creative gait.

● 19-DOF upper body ● IK & impedance ● ROS 2 ● Gantry gait

L9

Learning & deployment

Behavior trees, imitation / RL / VLA, the data factory, and deploying policies to the real robot.

● Behavior trees ● Imitation / RL / VLA ● Data factory ● Sim-to-real

What You'll Master

Organized by theme — research-grade tracks, and how hard each gets.

Mechanics & Kinematics

Easy

Drive a 19-DOF humanoid arm with impedance control, smooth every move at 500 Hz, then bend its whole-body Jacobian to your will.

Design & Modeling

Easy

Design a humanoid's exterior — split shells, motion clearance, cable and cooling routes — right up to a release-grade body.

Programming & Architecture

Easy

Direct a whole humanoid performance: multithreaded, behavior-tree-driven, rehearsed in sim and one-click-deployed to the real robot.

Motion & Control

Easy → moderate

Coordinate the entire body over its gait, master the gentle force control of real contact, and study balance hands-on.

Peripherals & End-effectors

Easy → moderate

Put five-finger hands to work — grasp, hand objects between arms, and teach new skills by guiding and replaying them.

AI & Perception

Easy

From perception in messy real light to imitation learning, RL and vision-language-action policies you run on a real humanoid.

Capstone

Easy → moderate

Cap it with a full perceive-reach-grasp-deliver demo — and write a research mini-paper that's truly your own.

AI Agents

Moderate

Wrap the humanoid's skills into an AI agent: say a few words and watch it perceive, plan and carry out a whole errand.

Data

Moderate

Run a real data factory — capture, retarget, clean and version human demos, then train, evaluate and re-collect. The loop real robots live on.

Simulation

Moderate

Spin up a humanoid digital twin, run thousands of sims in parallel, and close the sim-to-real gap to deploy for real.

Interaction (HRI)

Moderate

Give it a voice, a face and a feel for people — building up to reception- and tour-guide-grade interaction.

Meet the hardware

The products behind the curriculum — and the add-ons that extend each one.

FF Master

Engineering the Frontier

A 1.3 m bipedal humanoid — 30 DOF under student code, with research-grade balance and dexterous hands.

● Head sensor array ● Neck 2-DOF ● Arms 7-DOF ×2 ● Dexterous hands 15-DOF ● Torso 3-DOF ● Legs 6-DOF ×2 ● Foot sensors ● EtherCAT controller

Real industrial robotics

EtherCAT real-time, <1 ms — every joint under your code.

Real bipedal balance

ZMP + MPC whole-body control, lab-grade.

Five-finger dexterous hands

Force-controlled grasping and bimanual coordination.

Immersive VR teleoperation

First-person view + gesture mapping + force feedback.

Extend Master, Push Beyond Limits

Where teleoperation becomes body extension.

VR Headset (Meta Quest 3)

First-person immersive view + low-latency gesture mapping turn remote control into real body extension.

Five-Finger Dexterous Hand Kit

Independent per-finger force control, compliant grasping of fragile objects, bimanual assembly.