ROBOTS developed and made by Shenzhen companies and institutions impressed crowds at the 2017 World Robot Conference in Beijing.

Wearing a peaked cap and glasses, and sporting a handlebar mustache, a 1.55-meter-tall artist robot called Saidaqian stands in silence, fully devoted to sketching portraits of visitors in black ink at the conference.

Saidaqian was created by Shenzhen Academy of Robotics. A user’s photo can be sent to the robot’s system, and it will begin to draw the portrait, taking around five minutes to complete it.

According to Fang Siwen from the academy, Saidaqian’s appearance was designed to resemble the stereotype of foreign street artists. The robot can be used in museums, shopping malls and restaurants to teach drawing or attract customers.

The company has already sold two portrait robots prior to the conference, at a price of around 300,000 yuan (US$45,000) each. Customers can also rent a robot for nearly 8,000 yuan per month, said Fang.

At a time when humans are slowly forgetting how to write by hand, robots are willing and able to do the job and do it precisely.

A robotic arm called Dobot Magician paints a Chinese couplet with a brush pen and ink, attracting many onlookers at the conference. The arm is already well-known in China after its appearance on this year’s Spring Festival Gala online broadcast.

However, Dobot Magician’s main function is not writing characters, said Xiang Haibing, regional manager of Shenzhen Yuejiang Technology, the robotic arm’s creator. “It can also be used in other fields such as 3-D printing and laser engraving.”

Xiang said that the company has sold more than 5,000 similar robotic arms worldwide. Most of them were purchased by educational institutes to inspire students to be more innovative.

He admitted that anything is possible in the world of robots. In the future, perhaps robots will have self-learning abilities; have their own memories or even ideas. “So we will have higher demands on artists,” Xiang said.

Saidaqian and Dobot Magician are among robots with different specialties at the conference, which attracted exhibitors from around the world between Aug. 23 and 27. (Xinhua)