SUNDAY 10 MAY 2026
12:00 – 00:00 (BST)
Outplaying Elite Table Tennis Players with an Autonomous Robot
Today we'll be showing a running loop of videos from the supplementary material released as part of a recently published paper on current developments of Ace, an autonomous system which is designed to operate competitively with elite human table tennis players.
The video footage will play back-to-back, on loop for 12 hours from midday to midnight (BST) on our website.
This stream is of course not in collaboration or direct connection with Sony or any other institution affiliated with the research. We both just think the video footage is fascinating (both on its own and as a visual representation of this acute overlap of machine learning, robotics, high-speed sports, lab experimentation… and the compressing of all that within these videos of real-time play) and it's something we really want to share through our particular way of one-off, 12-hour streams.
Here's the abstract from the paper to give an idea of the study which led to this collection of footage that we'll be streaming on Sunday:
Outplaying elite table tennis players with an autonomous robot
Dürr, P., El Gheche, M., Maeda, G.J. et al.
Abstract
Artificial intelligence (AI) systems now challenge or surpass human experts in many computer games1,2. Physical and real-time sports such as table tennis, however, remain a major open challenge because of their requirements for fast, precise and adversarial interactions near obstacles and at the edge of human reaction time3. Here we present Ace, to our knowledge the first real-world autonomous system competitive with elite human table tennis players. Ace addresses the challenges of physical real-time interaction through a new, high-speed perception system using event-based vision sensors4, and a new control system based on model-free reinforcement learning, as well as state-of-the-art high-speed robot hardware. Evaluated in matches against elite and professional players under official competition rules, Ace achieved several victories and demonstrated consistent returns of high-speed, high-spin shots. These results highlight the potential of physical AI agents to perform complex, real-time interactive tasks, suggesting broader applications in domains requiring fast, precise human–robot interaction.
Available via Open Access
CC BY-NC-ND 4.0
Dürr, P., El Gheche, M., Maeda, G.J. et al. Outplaying elite table tennis players with an autonomous robot. Nature 652, 886–891 (2026). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-026-10338-5
Spryte is an online artist-led project. We show artists' moving-image works, as well as audio and text. These all take place sporadically online and are free to access. Spryte is fundamentally artist-run, we don’t really have any fixed programmes and we are sporadic, funded by ourselves and donations from individuals via Patreon starting from £1 (those who donate don't receive any extra access, it's just an opportunity for those who like the project to give some support). To keep up to date with Spryte's projects, please subscribe to our newsletter below!
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Previous streams:
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Joao Maria Gusmao + Pedro Paiva,
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Dora Budor & Noah Barker,
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Morag Keil,
Colectivo Los Ingrávidos,
Lydia Davies,
Pierre,
Nadim Choufi.
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Spryte was created and is managed by artists Rashi Rajguru and Cameron Scott.
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Spryte is artist-run and financially supported by individuals - parameters that are really important to us. In line with this, we would like to introduce something we really care about: that anywhere which shows work should be open to submissions and proposals, which are also treated exactly the same as the rest of the programme.
We are very happy to say that Spryte is open to submissions! We are going to keep the application process as light on your labour as possible. If you would like to submit a work - video/moving-image or text-based, please email us at hello@spryte.info with the subject as “Submission” + your name. In the email, please include a link to the work you would like us to see and any writing you feel necessary/relevant (there also doesn’t need to be any writing attached at all). To keep things equally light on our side, if we would like to stream the work we will get in touch.
Most importantly, we current only show works that have already been made (although we hope to fund/commission works in the distant future).
If successful the work will be streamed on Spryte (if moving-image) or posted on the website permanently (if text-based), just like all the other works we’ve shown.
Each presented work receives a £100 screening/artist fee (paid for thanks to the support of our patrons via Patreon, while we make up the rest). The fee reflects what the project can currently afford, but we hope and plan for this to grow as we increase our supporters!
We promote the stream or publication of text a week or two before on our newsletter, and some exhibition news websites.
In terms of what we look for, we keep this as open as possible. Our programme is very open in terms of subject and content - some streams are more audio-focused, others are live webcams, documentaries and other types of footage that sit more outside the realm of artist-made moving-image work (as well as some that are very much positioned within that realm, too). One key thread between all streams is a playful approach to narrative - something that we are deeply interested in and an element which spans many fields and mediums.
See our Archive page on our website for a look at what we’ve shown before - although, this is also just a slice of the type of work we are interested in showing.
We stream moving-image works on loop for 12 hours, on a Sunday (we may also try some 24 hours ones soon) on sporadic Sundays, approximately once a month (again, we’re hoping this grows... more funding = more streams!)
We can’t wait to see your work!
