WorldSkills 2024 Opens with Humanoid Robot Dances, Director Recalls 50m Safety Distance
The 48th WorldSkills Competition was held in Shanghai from September 22 to 27, featuring an approximately 90-minute opening ceremony with many highlights. WorldSkills is a prestigious global competition for vocational skills. The competition included 64 events and 1,385 participants, whose average age was 21. The event showcased the highest level of vocational skills from around the world.
On the occasion of the opening, First Financial conducted an exclusive interview with Hou Jie, the general director of the opening and closing ceremonies of this WorldSkills and art director of the Large-scale Events Department of Shanghai Media Group's Oriental Entertainment.
During the third chapter of the opening ceremony, titled "Light of the Future," there were several human-robot interaction segments. A full-size humanoid robot, standing 1.8 meters tall and weighing 140 kilograms, performed a delicate finger dance, danced alongside street dancers, and waltzed with a female actress. These human-robot interaction segments were all global premieres. The opening ceremony was a grand celebration of skills and innovation.
In the early stages, the team set up a robot training and debugging area of over 300 square meters in Lingang. To help the robots adapt to the stage rhythm, the director team used 18 imaging devices to capture human dance movements and then programmed them to assist the robots in training. Even a 0.1-degree deviation in gaze or a slight change in body movement required the entire program to be recompiled. The training process involved constant adjustments to ensure precision.
When the robots first rehearsed on stage, due to their large body weight and insufficient motion control precision, basic movements such as lifting legs and positioning damaged the stage floor, causing dents. During subsequent program debugging, equipment operators also suffered hand injuries multiple times. Dressing the robots in stage costumes was another challenge. Because the costumes lacked sufficient ventilation, the robots' body temperature quickly rose to 80 degrees Celsius within 10 minutes during operation, directly causing system overheating and crashes—equivalent to heatstroke—seriously affecting rehearsal progress. These technical hurdles highlight the complexities of integrating robots into live performances.
In the earliest rehearsals, the female dancers had to wear helmets throughout and maintain a safe distance of 50 meters from the robots, making close interaction impossible. As errors decreased and human-robot coordination improved, the distance was reduced from 50 meters to 40 meters to 30 meters, and eventually humans and robots could perform side by side, hold hands, and embrace in close proximity. The reduction in distance reflected improved coordination between humans and machines.
The audience saw an AI-controlled canopy suspended by more than 200 lifting points, which could move freely in the air, combine, and transform into various exclusive shapes. The rising and interlocking of the giant mortise and tenon mechanical device during the opening ceremony was a highlight of the entire event. The logo of this WorldSkills also extracted the mortise and tenon as an image symbol, which uses no steel nails or glue but relies on wooden structure interlocking. The mortise and tenon structure is a traditional Chinese architectural technique that relies on precise interlocking. The AI-controlled canopy added a dynamic visual element to the ceremony.
To make this 200-ton giant mortise and tenon mechanical device rise from beneath the stage's floor and achieve precise interlocking, the team visited the factory five times to follow up on testing. Initially, the complete assembly took nearly 5 minutes. After repeated debugging, it was compressed to 3 minutes, 2 minutes, 1 minute 45 seconds, 1 minute 20 seconds, and finally to just over 1 minute to complete the rise and interlocking. The team's repeated testing led to significant improvements in the device's performance.
The opening ceremony relied on AI to complete stage position calculations, program roadshow simulations, aerial lifting point layouts, and canopy shape deductions. The core giant mortise and tenon device of the opening ceremony will become a permanent art installation after the competition, housed in the Shanghai Global Celebrity Museum. This permanent installation will preserve the legacy of the event.