flickerminick online

ta-da!

please visit the official flickerminick project website.

documentation

the aftermath.

view : unabridged contents of digital camera from the fab open house

view : unabridged contents of digital camera from the fab open haus

comfy website for flickerminick is in the works. will publish accordingly.


the enormous room is a wee bit more comfy than e15-023...

finale

done!



five parts, all succesfully executed:
1. fans change in intensity via pwm, inflating and deflating the body
2. tentacles twitch with [10!] stepper motors
3. the LEDs in the interior modulate from bright white to soft purple with each breath
4. el wire looks amazing...
5. IR transceiver: if you get too close, be prepared to be stung!

in the making




code
jellyfish.c

eagle files
jellyetch.sch
jellyetch.brd

board


unfortunately, the chip wasnt working properly on the etched board; but i just threw everything on a breadboard and went to town with wire and clips. unexpected nicety: you can't see the mess in the dark!



movies

thursday thoughts

[must sleep now]

now i have the jellyfish breathing with random frequency. sweet!

i recut the parts for the motors, and they fit well. new problem: not enough torque to spin the sucker. will try the couplings soon. hopefully. yes.

managed to get 5 (probably even more!) superbright LEDs going off of one output pin, no resistors necessary.

gross thought: many-a-plugin-adapter hanging from the apparatus. i wish it were cordless...

[i love purple.]

wednesday woes

[the aftermath]

update...

motors
tried to find the sweet spot. right now my pulse delay is around 1200 - 1500, and the motors run smoothly but they're overheating like crazy. my acrylic pulleys are melting, so need to cut some more. should try to cut the middle hole, maybe around 40 mils in diameter with slits to fit. need more radius for sizable rotational effect... i'll try cutting 1in, 2in, and perhaps 3in pieces.

tentacles
i like the fluidity of the silk thread. thoughts on EL wire... could illuminate when photosensors are dark.

midweek maintenance

[juicing up jellyfish]

updates from last time
so, since my project has a bunch of different parts, here's the breakdown of components in order of priority: pulsating body with fans (works oh-so-beautifully), twitching tentacles (working on getting the timing of the motors down now), illuminating additions (just need to insulate the EL wire effectively, but the glow is perfect), a smattering of LEDs (the 12V ones are superbright!) poking about in random locations within the body, and lastly incorporating the IR sensor for interactivity.

body
so the fans are much more powerful now that i have the 12V 1amp wall wort plugged in. they're so fast that they blow themselves over! too cool... a collective 288 cpm :) the overlaying of shimmery fabrics is wonderfully fluid, and the inflation appears nice and organic. the fans create a little noise, but the ebb + flow of the winds enable a breathy sensation. flow...

tentacles
the circuit and everything works, but the motors are getting really hot and twitchy. tonight's theme: coordinate the timing correctly so the stepper moves smoothly. later theme: getting better press-fit parts. when heated up, the acrylic loses its tightness around the 0.055 shaft (so tiny!). i may use couplings, and press-fit over them, or do a different style of fit where the hole is quite small with two slits to allow for selective expansion + compression.

EL wire
note to self: do not short out the wire through the inverter. 120 volts can cause a shock! :) but the phosphorous makes a wondrous glow. not sure whether to use as tentacles (they're not that flexible) or to just augment the mess underneath with EL. pulsating glow. maybe a random flicker.

as far as presentation goes, will suspend from the overhang in the media lab atrium with fishing wire. lovely.

[breadboarding now, but goal is to get circuit milled/etched/stuffed by the end of friday.]

gotta love those alligator clips. solder is for wimps.

making waves with the jelly

[ongoing news + progress]

so it's sunday night and the time is right. the last week has been well spent fabbing, circuiting, and hair-pulling. here's the update:

materials

• ATmega16
  
• IR transceiver
  
• clear acrylic base corel file dxf: this has a series of holes cut into it to attach (via pretty ribbon) the motors, the fabric for the body, and hooks for hanging
  
• fabric for the body: shimmery ivory organza and iridescent purple/pink/blue (it matches the violet LEDs!) georgette
  
• ribbons + string: pinky and beigy (visceral colors) kinky ribbon for the inner parts, and silk cord for tentacles, and ties for the motors and fans
  
• fans: huge $14.99 case fans from microcenter, each of which outputs 72 cubic feet per minute. WHOA. i have four of them.
  
• motors: ten stepper motors to twitch. i might have killed one of them already. details follow.
  
• lots and lots of mosfets.
  getting a little current-crazy.
• acrylic pulleys: lasercut components in which to tie the tentacles onto the motors
  
• thin copper wire: to sew LEDs into the fabric
  
• LEDs: violet for sparkle, bright-white for illumination
  
• ELwire + inverter from coolight: still pending. but pink tail wire + white 2.3mm wire to string along tentacles
  
• some sort of stand: thinking along the lines of a suspended birdcage. second best thing: a wheeley portable wardrobe.
  
• circuit [prototype as of now]: schematic, board, gerber
  

what works

• circuit: so i fleshed out a quasi-realistic schematic for the board. a little (well, super) tricky to route, so just breadboarding at this time until the circuit fleshes out completely. havent decided whether to modella it or etch, but the board seems like it'll be really big. planning on using the ATmega16 chip, with 32 glorious pins to work with. the basic organization is PORTA -> IR transceiver to detect proximity, PORTB -> fans, PORTC -> motors, PORTD -> LEDs.
  
• AVR: right now, testing on the AT90S8515 chip with the STK500!!! unsurprisingly, coding in C has been a godsend. using winAVR with programmer's notepad + avr studio. a little tricky + finicky; lots of late nights spent head-scratching, thanks to drained batteries, defective alligator clips, a wayward LED, and software crashes.
  
• proximity sensing: played around witih IR transceiver, and know how it's working. very cool.
  
• body: initial attempts using four small case fans were paltry, sad, flaccid. the fabric's a bit sheer and porous, but the fans failed to make it budge. basically, they blew [pun intended]. scavenged microcenter for some mightier fans. definitely hit the jackpot with these super ones that even come with their own modulation knob. tied them up prettily in bows with silk cord and strapped them, damsel-to-traintracks-esque, to the base. good news: got PWM working on the fans to adjust the speed. managed to hook (n+1) fans up so they coordinate and spin synchronously. each fan (12V, 0.5 amp per) is attached to its own mosfet to maximize the wind output.
  
• tentacles: got stepper motor to work, but then it started to flip out and get warm + stop working + twitch. the motors are tied to the underside of the base, and tentacles are tied onto lasercut pulley-hooks on the motor. as the motors pulse on and off, the impulse wiggles down the attached string. each motor has its own mosfet, though all of their motions are coordinated, so all assigned to identical pin.
  

below, the four fans installed onto the base. the fabric PWM-poofs!


what will work

• interactivity: havent hooked up the IR transceiver to the circuitry yet,
  but i have parts working on breadboard. when a person gets close/touching, the lights will flicker, the white lights will refresh illumination, and the body + legs will convulse.
  
• coordination: getting the timing right so that motors, fans, and lights work together simultaneously.
  
• the LEDs: the LEDs will be distributed about the fabric body, sewn using copper wire as thread.
  
• suspension: jellyfish will be hung with clear fishing line [how appropriate!] from some sort of hook. first thought was a freestanding doorjamb-like thing, but a birdcage will work nicely. trying to find one, or will fabricate a good solution.