# SculptDiff: Learning Robotic Clay Sculpting from Humans with Goal Conditioned Diffusion Policy

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2403.10401 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2403.10401/

## Key facts

- Cited by 7 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- Placed in Diffusion and flow policies for robotics, one of 14 directions in Diffusion models.
- Builds on 33 of its 44 references that are in the map.
- First posted on arXiv 15 Mar 2024.

## Placed in

- Diffusion models / [Diffusion and flow policies for robotics](https://mlsanity.com/diffusion/diffusion-and-flow-policies-for-robotics/)

## Builds on (most cited first, 30 of 33)

- [Denoising Diffusion Probabilistic Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2006.11239/) (2020)
- [ShapeNet: An Information-Rich 3D Model Repository](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1512.03012/) (2015)
- [Diffusion Policy: Visuomotor Policy Learning via Action Diffusion](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2303.04137/) (2023)
- [RT-1: Robotics Transformer for Real-World Control at Scale](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2212.06817/) (2022)
- [Learning Fine-Grained Bimanual Manipulation with Low-Cost Hardware](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2304.13705/) (2023)
- [Point-BERT: Pre-training 3D Point Cloud Transformers with Masked Point Modeling](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2111.14819/) (2021)
- [Image Augmentation Is All You Need: Regularizing Deep Reinforcement Learning from Pixels](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2004.13649/) (2020)
- [BC-Z: Zero-Shot Task Generalization with Robotic Imitation Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2202.02005/) (2022)
- [Behavior Transformers: Cloning k modes with one stone](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2206.11251/) (2022)
- [Q-Diffusion: Quantizing Diffusion Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2302.04304/) (2023)
- [RoboAgent: Generalization and Efficiency in Robot Manipulation via Semantic Augmentations and Action Chunking](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2309.01918/) (2023)
- [The Surprising Effectiveness of Representation Learning for Visual Imitation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2112.01511/) (2021)
- [PlasticineLab: A Soft-Body Manipulation Benchmark with Differentiable Physics](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2104.03311/) (2021)
- [RoboCook: Long-Horizon Elasto-Plastic Object Manipulation with Diverse Tools](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2306.14447/) (2023)
- [Learning Predictive Representations for Deformable Objects Using Contrastive Estimation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2003.05436/) (2020)
- [RoboCraft: Learning to See, Simulate, and Shape Elasto-Plastic Objects with Graph Networks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2205.02909/) (2022)
- [Learning Visible Connectivity Dynamics for Cloth Smoothing](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2105.10389/) (2021)
- [FabricFlowNet: Bimanual Cloth Manipulation with a Flow-based Policy](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2111.05623/) (2021)
- [Point Cloud Matters: Rethinking the Impact of Different Observation Spaces on Robot Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2402.02500/) (2024)
- [DiffSkill: Skill Abstraction from Differentiable Physics for Deformable Object Manipulations with Tools](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2203.17275/) (2022)
- [Mesh-based Dynamics with Occlusion Reasoning for Cloth Manipulation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2206.02881/) (2022)
- [ACID: Action-Conditional Implicit Visual Dynamics for Deformable Object Manipulation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2203.06856/) (2022)
- [DexDeform: Dexterous Deformable Object Manipulation with Human Demonstrations and Differentiable Physics](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2304.03223/) (2023)
- [One ACT Play: Single Demonstration Behavior Cloning with Action Chunking Transformers](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2309.10175/) (2023)
- [Contact Points Discovery for Soft-Body Manipulations with Differentiable Physics](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2205.02835/) (2022)
- [Real-to-Sim Registration of Deformable Soft Tissue with Position-Based Dynamics for Surgical Robot Autonomy](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2011.00800/) (2020)
- [Learning Closed-loop Dough Manipulation Using a Differentiable Reset Module](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2207.04638/) (2022)
- [Learning Visual Shape Control of Novel 3D Deformable Objects from Partial-View Point Clouds](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2110.04685/) (2021)
- [SculptBot: Pre-Trained Models for 3D Deformable Object Manipulation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2309.08728/) (2023)
- [Deformable Linear Object Prediction Using Locally Linear Latent Dynamics](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2103.14184/) (2021)

## Built on by (most cited first, 7 of 7)

- [RT-Cache: Training-Free Retrieval for Real-Time Manipulation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2505.09040/) (2025)
- [Manipulating Elasto-Plastic Objects With 3D Occupancy and Learning-Based Predictive Control](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2505.16249/) (2025)
- [VLM-TDP: VLM-guided Trajectory-conditioned Diffusion Policy for Robust Long-Horizon Manipulation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2507.04524/) (2025)
- [PinchBot: Long-Horizon Deformable Manipulation with Guided Diffusion Policy](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2507.17846/) (2025)
- [LinkD: AutoRegressive Diffusion Model for Mechanical Linkage Synthesis](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2601.04054/) (2026)
- [Visual Sculpting: Visually-Aligned Planning Representations for Long-Horizon Robot Clay Sculpting](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2605.17556/) (2026)
- [Rotation-Aware Point-Cloud Embeddings for Vision-Based In-Hand Reorientation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2606.21788/) (2026)

## Abstract (arXiv)

Manipulating deformable objects remains a challenge within robotics due to the difficulties of state estimation, long-horizon planning, and predicting how the object will deform given an interaction. These challenges are the most pronounced with 3D deformable objects. We propose SculptDiff, a goal-conditioned diffusion-based imitation learning framework that works with point cloud state observations to directly learn clay sculpting policies for a variety of target shapes. To the best of our knowledge this is the first real-world method that successfully learns manipulation policies for 3D deformable objects. For sculpting videos and access to our dataset and hardware CAD models, see the project website: https://sites.google.com/andrew.cmu.edu/imitation-sculpting/home