Rowel Atienza is an Associate Professor at the Electrical and Electronics Engineering Institute of the University of the Philippines, Diliman. He holds the Dado and Maria Banatao Institute Professorial Chair in Artificial Intelligence. Rowel has been fascinated with intelligent robots since he graduated from the University of the Philippines. He received his MEng from the National University of Singapore for his work on an AI-enhanced four-legged robot. He finished his Ph.D. at The Australian National University for his contribution on the field of active gaze tracking for human-robot interaction. Rowel's current research work focuses on AI and computer vision. He dreams on building useful machines that can perceive, understand, and reason. To help make his dreams become real, Rowel has been supported by grants from the Department of Science and Technology (DOST), Samsung Research Philippines, and Commission on Higher Education-Philippine California Advanced Research Institutes (CHED-PCARI).
I would like to thank my family, Che, Diwa, and Jacob. They never cease to support my work.
I would like to thank my mother who instilled into me the value of education.
I would like to express my gratitude to the people of Packt and this book's technical reviewer, Frank, Kishor, Alex, and Valerio. They are inspiring and easy to work with.
I would like to thank the institutions who always support my teaching and research agenda, University of the Philippines, DOST, Samsung Research PH, and CHED-PCARI.
I would like to acknowledge my students. They have been patient as I develop my courses in AI.