Paper Bits

Apr 21

“The weirdest experience of the night: pushing a Portal button, the one I’ve seen in the game so many times, and having it behave as I’d expect: noises from the game, an iris door opening, and GLaDOS talking to me. Seeing something virtual become real with such fidelity is bizarre: it’s a tribute to Tom Wyatt (@fridgehead) that it worked so well.” Ridiculous Minigolf « Tom Scott (via iamdanw)

(via iamdanw)

Dec 7

Arduino-compatible Skymega board for powering and controlling servo-based printbots.

Far more compact than an arduino if you’re controlling 4 servos, because of the need for multiple power supplies and a breakout board for the servos. I could use this, but sadly you have to have the PCB custom-printed and source the parts, which is a bit of a pain…

Nov 25

[Flash 10 is required to watch video]

I’m still working on the build instructions and proper code for the MindWave Cat Ears, but while I do, here’s the first motion-test video from this summer.

It’s a 30-second video I took of the very first time I put on a headset, flipped a switch, and saw the ears move according to my brain waves. I was able to make them stand up, flatten down, and wiggle.

That was a good day.

Nov 17

iamdanw:

ADBB - Bendy Corner Arduino Box (by oomlout) - Bendy laser corners!

I want one of these, yes I do.

Nov 11

MindWave Cat Ears on GitHub

And now the arduino source code is online.

(I am not a real programmer. Please don’t laugh. Or go ahead, laugh, but then you get to fix it.)

Nov 7

Some notes on the cat ears:

They’re based on the NeuroSky MindWave headset and an arduino nano.
They move up and down as the wearer’s attention changes. I tried to make their movement as natural as possible.
They’re still under development. Lots of work still needed.
I have no real plans to turn them into a product yet. But I plan to turn it into a framework for people to build on.

Sep 20

bashford:

Social Firefly is a reactive/interactive installation made from intelligent lights that influence one another. It was created by Jason McDermott and Liam Ryan (Arup) with Frank McGuire for the Vivid 2011 festival in Sydney.

“Social Firefly is a demonstration of how interaction design can be dynamic, beautiful and playful, as well as teaching us about our relationship to other creatures with which we share this earth. Inspiration came from lateral and cellular communication systems such as those used by fireflies in synchronizing their rhythms and slime molds in movements through caves, which collided with network theories and cascading relationships between the parts and the whole. These were then shaken together with the Vivid 2011 theme of Fiat Lux and user centered interaction design to create the light installation that is Social Firefly.”

More info (and photos) on Creative Applications.

Sep 14

Main board on Flickr.

The MindWave RF dongle needs 3V power, which the arduino nano can’t provide when it’s running on battery power.

After a lot of back-and-forth, I settled on the simple solution of adding a pair of AA batteries to the circuit.

Sep 4

InkShield: An Open Source Inkjet Shield for Arduino by Nicholas C Lewis — Kickstarter

This shield allows you to connect a HP C6602 inkjet cartridge to your Arduino turning it into a 96dpi print platform. It only uses 5 pins which can be jumper selected to avoid other shields. It is designed with a Arduino Mega footprint but fully supports both the Arduino and the Arduino Mega. It is designed with all through-hole components to make assembly easy even for beginners.

Can’t wait to get mine.

Aug 10

Kickstarter - Pulse Sensor: an Open Source Heart-rate Sensor that Rocks

This is an optical pulse-rate sensor for Arduino or your computer:

After a few months of testing a gaggle of techniques, we developed what we think is an innovative pulse sensor. Our prototype (and accompanying code) plugs right into Arduino and easily clips onto a fingertip or earlobe. It’s super small too, button-sized with holes, so it can be sewn into a garment as well. We’d like to manufacturer the actual pulse sensor, making it low-cost, open source, and accessible for students, artists, and developers.

I have a project in mind that might just benefit from this…

Jul 23

Controlling servos with MindWave, a set on Flickr.Documentation shots of an arduino-based working model, which controls a set of four servo motors with the NeuroSky MindWave EEG headset.

Controlling servos with MindWave, a set on Flickr.

Documentation shots of an arduino-based working model, which controls a set of four servo motors with the NeuroSky MindWave EEG headset.

Jul 18

Programming iPhone Sensors

O’Reilly Media is publishing a book on programming and communicating with sensor networks with iOS devices, called iOS Sensor Apps with Arduino.

The examples and apps in the book rely on the Redpark Serial Cable, which provides a dock-connector–to-RS-232-serial link for iPhone, iPad, and the iPod Touch. This cable makes communicating with an arduino, sensors, or other elements of the internet of things much easier. That’s exciting, because until now, the tight integration with Arduino-based devices and sensors was a major source of Android envy.

Interestingly, there doesn’t seem to be an option to pre-order an eBook from O’Reilly. I wonder why?

Jun 23

A Slow Display… E-Paper + Arduino

Luckily for us, SparkFun started selling [an] E-Paper display and breakout board, finally bringing this great technology to a place where we can slap it on the back of our Arduinos.

They’ve got a tutorial with an example library and code.

May 8

Phi-connect is a wire/cable management system for Arduino. It passes all Arduino connections to a breadboard with one cable. You can connect your Arduino to a project with just one step.

(via Phi-connect arduino cable management - Liudr arduino and physics gadgets - InMojo)

Phi-connect is a wire/cable management system for Arduino. It passes all Arduino connections to a breadboard with one cable. You can connect your Arduino to a project with just one step.

(via Phi-connect arduino cable management - Liudr arduino and physics gadgets - InMojo)

May 6

What price cat ears?

As a rough estimate, it might take a bit under $500 to make an initial prototype of these mind-controlled cat ears using a MindSet interface and Arduino.¹

That’s a back-of-the-envelope calculation which guesses that I’d probably fry some hardware, end up with the wrong motors, and so on.

If, however, I pulled apart a Mattel ‘Mind Flex’ game for parts, then the brain interface and controller component could be had for as little as $130-150.

An unknown factor: how tricky would it be to make the ears? The arduino can control stepper motors, and in the video, the ears seem to simply pivot on a single axis, rather than articulating fully. The only real problem I see is being able to miniaturize and hide the components.

The brain interface might be tricky to tune, but it can’t be that hard. (Famous last words.)

I wonder how hard it would be to do rabbit ears, rather than cat ears, and have the bunny ears droop? (You’d need to have some kind of mechanism to stiffen and relax the ears, rather than pivoting them.)

It’s an interesting thought. I’ve no real plans to invest between two and five hundred dollars and an indefinite amount of time in duplicating someone else’s product.

And yet.

Incidentally, the latest issue of Make Magazine has a tutorial on doing exactly this. ↩