#bb8 builders

As a Chinese Japanese American growing up in the late 90s to early 2000s there were really only three influential asian american male role models on television and film: John Cho, Jackie Chan and Grant Imahara. But if you were also a shy awkward kid that felt out of place except the science of making and building robots, Grant Imahara was your role model.

Watching Grant on the original Mythbusters figure out a physics or engineering problem was like watching a pro-athlete play their best competitive game. As the "Geek" and smartest member of the build team, he would explain how much fulminated mercury it took to destroy an office, or describe how a robotic surfer to catch waves from an explosion. The man was in his element when he was behind a workshop and the joy he had building was infectious. Being a nerd, I couldn't relate to others excitement discussing talks about high school dating, prom dances or getting driver's licenses. But seeing a guy construct insanely dangerous machines and laugh maniacally at others reactions to him- that I understood.

It wasn't until I got older that I realized how far reaching Grant's involvement was with the Maker Community even outside the show. The man absolutely loved animatronics and robotics outside his day job and I would sometimes find him on the pages of the R2 Builders group, BB-8 Builders group and Project 842. The sheer amount of builders that are also showing off photos with him demonstrate not only that Grant was a television icon but also went lengths to get involved with the community, be excited and openly collaborate with them. He was a Maker's Maker.

I only met Grant once during a shoot for Singularity University. They were doing a promo piece on Human Robot Interaction and wanted our lab's Pepper to "interview" Grant during the shoot. I had the enviable task of scripting out the robot's conversational dialogue, accurately programming the triggers and then getting it to work on command. After a week of strenuous tweaking (and an excessive amount of coffee), I got it so Pepper could respond to phrases on command. Day of the shoot, Pepper was literally carted from SJ to SF using Uber Max, and the entire team is ready to go. Grant is on set (much like the image below) and I'm on standby with my coworker Elle. Cameras are rolling, everything is starting, director indicates to Grant to start:

Grant: "Hi I'm Grant Imahara! Many of us have wondered what the future of robotics might be like. Will the be the scary AI oppressors from the Terminator movies? Or will they be friendly and sociable, like my friend Pepper. Hello, Pepper!"

Pepper:"........"

Grant:"......Hello, Pepper!"

Pepper:"........."

Grant:"....mm, You see, Pepper is a four foot humanoid ro-"

Pepper:"HELLO GRANT, IT IS NICE TO MEET YOU!"

Grant and Pepper (before realizing what he stepped into)

See what had happened was, Pepper's conversational dialogue relies on a Nuance, a cloud based API, to trigger all voice recognition and in order to sift through so many dialects the program had to pull a lot of data. This worked fine in the lab where internet speed was fast, but On Set during the shoot, the robot had around 7 seconds of delay from listening and responding. Grant would try to talk to Pepper, Pepper kept missing it's cues, and Grant would keep his cool and keep going.

This shit went on. For twenty agonizing minutes.

After the shoot was done, I was horribly embarrassed went up to Grant and apologized profusely. "Don't worry about!" Grant laughs "These things happen all the time. I've had so many problems with Geoff before we started filming!" We start riffing more and droid presentations, he talks about his experience with R2 building and I discuss BB8 building and within seconds my embarrassment is gone and I'm just talking to a regular maker fair visitor.

From Right to Left: Elle, Myself, Pepper and Grant

When I think back on that day now several years later, I don't think of the embarrassment or frustration at myself but instead of the friendliness and professionalism that was Grant. Before the shoot I had mentioned to him he was my favorite Mythbuster and I always looked up to him as a kid. He grinned and said he did miss it but had moved onto other exciting projects (White Rabbit). He then said the world needs more Asian representation on media and arts- and he was right.

Grant Imahara's young passing isn't just another celebrity death. He was the redefinition of the Hollywood Asian Nerd stereotype and seeing him on screen helped inspire many others to pursue careers in engineering, special effects or acting. He loved his work and was passionate about sharing it with others and his absence has left a void that won't soon be filled.