brycewang-stanford IROS Supplementary
At IROS the "supplement" is essentially one short video, not an appendix. There is no supplementary PDF, so the video is the only extra channel — and IROS caps it tighter than its siblings. Treat it as a piece of evidence a reviewer watches before reading, not as a highlight reel.
The video envelope (2026 anchor — reverify)
- Length: up to 60 seconds. This is half of ICRA's window; a video cut for ICRA must be re-edited, not merely re-uploaded.
- Size: up to 10 MB. Encode for clarity within the cap rather than shipping a soft 60 MB export.
- Format: mpg / mpeg / mp4.
- Deadline: its own date (2026: March 5), a few days after the paper — plan for it separately.
What earns its 60 seconds
- Uncut real trials. One or two continuous takes of the system doing the task on the real robot beats a montage of cuts that hides the seams.
- At least one labeled failure. Showing a failure and naming it builds more trust than an unbroken string of successes, which reviewers read as cherry-picked.
- Honest playback speed. Caption any speed-up ("4x") on screen; silent time compression is a credibility leak.
- Legible conditions. A caption stating the platform, the task, and that trials are representative orients the viewer in the first seconds.
Storyboard for a 60-second cut
| Seconds | Content | Purpose |
|---|---|---|
| 0-8 | Title card: task, platform, "representative trials"; no author/lab identity | Orient without leaking identity |
| 8-35 | One or two uncut successful trials at honest speed | Show the system actually runs |
| 35-50 | One labeled failure with its cause on screen | Prove honesty; preempt skepticism |
| 50-60 | A condition sweep or second environment, if it fits | Show it is not one lucky setting |
Anonymizing footage (2026 double-anonymous cycle)
- Crop or blur institute banners, door signs, logo'd safety vests, and building-specific scenery.
- Strip identifying audio (a named voice, a lab intercom) — mute or replace with captions.
- Check file metadata and the filename for author or organization strings before upload.
- Remove any on-screen URL that carries a lab organization name.
Compensating for the missing PDF supplement
Because there is no appendix, decision-critical material cannot live "in the supplement." The metric definition, the trial protocol, and the key ablation must be in the paper body. Use the video to show behavior, not to carry an argument the body omits — a reviewer who mutes the video should still be able to evaluate the contribution.
Pre-upload video check:
duration <= 60 s ? size <= 10 MB ? format mp4/mpg/mpeg ?
uncut real trial shown ? >=1 labeled failure ? speed captioned ?
no lab identity in frames, audio, filename, or metadata ?
plays on a machine without lab codecs ?
Output format
[Video status] Ready / Needs fixes / Not ready
[Envelope] <s>s / <MB>MB / format / deadline ok?
[Evidence quality] uncut trials? failure shown? speed honest?
[Anonymity] frames/audio/metadata/filename checked?
[Body dependency] what argument must move from video into the paper body?