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MindKits News and Blog

Arduino Cheat Sheet

Tim Carr - Friday, April 30, 2010

Do you remember those cheat sheets from your school days. Or the ones that you get with computer games? Were you wondering if there was one for the Arduino? Well your wait is over. I came across this great Ardunio cheat sheet and thought you might be is useful.

http://sites.google.com/site/mechatronicsguy/arduinocheatsheet/Arduino%20cheet%20sheet%20v02bsmall.png

Arduino-controlled mood lamp

Tim Carr - Monday, April 26, 2010

We have mood rings that tell us our mood....so what about robotics telling us about our mood? Check this moody project out.

Minneapolis maker Michael Krumpus, created this lovely mood lamp made out of LEDs, an Arduino Duemilanove, and glass vials.

This is a mood lamp I build using 16 LEDs of different colors and small glass vials. The square bottoms of the vials look a lot like glass block, and the glass diffuses and scatters the light in beautiful ways. The software shows random patterns of light and the brightness of each LED can vary -- they aren't simply "on" or "off".

The Arduino code is pretty complex because it implements PWM (pulse-width modulation) for all 16 LEDs. The Arduino board only has 5 PWM-capable pins, so providing PWM for all 16 pins is accomplished purely in the code. The lamp randomly displays different lighting patterns and can be really mesmerizing.

 

moodLamp1.jpg


Day table made of wood, that tracks the light.

Tim Carr - Monday, April 19, 2010

It amazes me how many talented people are out there in this world. And the only thing that stops them or us is our imagination. So I just had to share this with you.

 

Day Table:  LEDs OnDay Table: LEDs On

LEDs OffLEDs Off SensingSensing

The Day Table table acts as a record of the previous day by sensing ambient light levels in its environment and displaying them through 24 LED strips embedded just below its surface.  The rightmost LEDs show the most recent light levels and the leftmost show the light levels of a day ago.  Day and night transitions can be seen, as well as human activity through actions such as turning lights on and off in the room where the table resides.


The table is made of bird's eye maple with a Danish oil followed by polyurethane finish.  An Arduino Duemilanove and eight Shiftbars (a three-channel PWM LED driver) control the 24 LED strips and photoresistor sensors.  With all LEDs on the table uses about 20W.


Light SensorLight Sensor UndercarriageUndercarriage

InnardsInnards

Interactive Audio Sculpture Garden

Tim Carr - Monday, April 12, 2010

So I was looking around my house the other day and thought where could I take the Arduino next? I was sitting on the deck and thought that maybe the garden would be the next step. As luck would have it thanks to the power of the Internet I came across this great little project which I think would be perfect for next summer.

Makers Stephanie McCarty and Andrew Siu built this fun interactive audio device using a couple of Arduino and miscellaneous parts.

A stand-alone Interactive Musical Device that produces tones and loops. Made using Arduino Boards, Wave Shields, IR Sensors and Servo Motors, sound can be manipulated by physically moving and controlling certain elements of the device. IR sensors detect the distances of propeller blades triggering a corresponding tone to emit from the device. Rotations of the propellers are controlled by 2 potentiometers (silver knobs) at the front of the device which alter the tempo of the resulting tones.


SparkL Motion, an Arduino-powered ribbon necklace

Tim Carr - Monday, April 05, 2010

So you may have heard that  a few weeks ago in the US there was the Arduio Art Show in New York City. There was a huge range of talent from a wide variety of the arts, and I though that this one was a worth sharing. New Zealand wearable Arts had better watch out!

 sparkl_motion_necklace.jpg

Jen Savage of Alpha One Labs combined her software and sewing skills to make this SparkL Motion ribbon necklace. Her first Arduino project, it is based around a Lilypad Arduino, and uses an accelerometer to detect motion and flash the LEDs accordingly. Full construction details and source code are available at her site. Jen's video can be seen here.

Easter wouldn't be the same without your Arduino

Tim Carr - Sunday, April 04, 2010

So in the spirit of Easter I wondered if anyone had taken mixed Arduino and Easter. And sure enough, someone has made this clever Arduino Easter Bonnet, powered by an Arduino micro controller. Very cute!

T-shirt modded to let you know when you have new emails, won't tell you why your friends are avoiding you

Tim Carr - Thursday, April 01, 2010

Found this great link on Engadget with a guy turning his T-Shirt into an email alert shirt-o-awesome. He used an Arduino Lilypad but you could easily use a ProMini which in my opinion are smaller, cheaper and better.

You probably don't have enough reminders that you're always a little behind, right? Well Chris and his wife Madeline decided to make one more for themselves: a t-shirt that lights up when you have new emails, and also tells you the number in your inbox. Using an Arduino Lilypad microcontroller, a few LEDs, conductive thread, and a Bluetooth dongle to communicate with an Android phone nearby (which has access to the inbox), Chris took a custom printed shirt and rigged up this badboy. It's actually pretty good looking as far as these things go, but we still don't know if we need this in our already alert-ridden lives. Regardless, the video's after the break if you're thinking about cobbling together your own.

 

Video:

Super Mario Bros on an 8x8 LED matrix

Tim Carr - Wednesday, March 24, 2010

 How cool is this for a bunch of off the shelf parts?

"This is a game project for S10-05833 - Gadgets, Sensors, and Activity Recognition in HCI taught by Scott Hudson at Carnegie Mellon University. I created a simple version of Super Mario Bros using an 8x8 LED matrix (one color), an Arduino Nano, two buttons for the input (forward and jump), and a piezo sensor hooked to a separate Arduino for the theme song."

Credits:
Scrolling code: Oomlout 8x8 Scrolling Message (oomlout.com/8X8M/8X8M-Guide.pdf)
Level maps: Super Pixel Bros (bit.ly/superpixbros) (transcribed by hand into bytes -- solid areas are 1's and empty areas are 0's)
Sheet music: mariopiano.com/mario-sheet-music-overworld-main-theme.html (transcribed notes are used with piezo code: arduino.cc/en/Tutorial/Tone)

Super Mario Bros on an 8x8 LED matrix from Chloe Fan on Vimeo.

PixAXE Tank Bot - nice!

Tim Carr - Thursday, February 11, 2010
We love tanks, did I mention that already? Well as you may know we've decided to expand things a little and have brought in PicAXE kits to get you started. I love Arduino but also love PicAXE because it's just so darned easy to program which means even I can do it after a night out with the lads in town.
So, check out what this chap did with his PicAXE:



From http://tomthegeek.blogspot.com/2010/01/picaxe-08m-lego-tank.html
"Here's my first PicAxe 08M project, an IR controlled Lego tank. It features PWM Lego Power Function (LPF) motor control and a laser pointer "cannon". I built this because I wanted something fun to do with the PicAxe and Lego doesn't make any tank kits. This can be easily replicated using the LPF IR Remote and receiver but where's the fun in that? The turret rotates but only by hand, the 08M doesn't have enough pins to drive more than two motors. In the next version of the tank I plan on adding motorized turret rotation and elevation."

Yep, more new stuff. We just can't help ourselves

Tim Carr - Friday, January 22, 2010
We've had the mother of all shipments come in to replenish all those tinkering goodies that we had run out of and supply us with a load of new goodies to tinker with.
Check out the new stuff:

Tank Treads

http://www.mindkits.co.nz/_product_50845/Tank_Treads


PicAXE Kit

http://www.mindkits.co.nz/_product_50845/PICAXE-14M_Starter_Pack
If you're coming to electronics and tinkering more from the electronics side you may want to check out PICAXE. You can program these the normal way by typing at a keyboard or you can design your programs using flow diagrams and dragging blocks onto the screen and then uploading that program to the micro. We've taken a but of a shine to these PicAXE boards really as they are cheap and really quick to get up and running.

Arduino Screwshield

http://www.mindkits.co.nz/_product_50845/Arduino_ScrewShield

Now, I know we've had these in before but they sold out so quickly that they may as well not have hit our shelves. So, this time we've got a few more. They make it really easy to secure wiring to the Arudino without having to worry that it's going to fall off while you're using your project.


New RFID Tags - Glass Cap and a Button


http://www.mindkits.co.nz/_product_50845/RFID_Glass_Capsule_-_125kHz
http://www.mindkits.co.nz/_product_50845/RFID_Button_-_16mm

Now you can embed your tag in your shoe, wallet, clothes or even your hand.
If you do end up getting your hand tagged, email me and I'll buy you lunch.