Check it out! In less than two years (since Aug 2011-Apr 2013) I hit over a thousand followers on my thingiverse profile; I am super jazzed!! I never would have seen this coming back when it all started.

To celebrate I am going to make something really friggen’ super wicked awesome for all of my loyal followers! While it is to be determined what that will be and it will take some time I will only say this…Star Wars.

The story behind the…vision.

Like thousands being born without 3d vision, I want to experience distance. I thought I have a hearing aid so why not a seeing aid?

What would it look like if I were to make a device that allowed me, or the user, to experience visual information in a new way? Distance and heat seemed to be likely candidates. Safe from oncoming objects and fires or heat sources like machinery. I thought an infrared heat sensor is accurate enough and an ultrasonic distance sensor that would be relevant at a personal body distance of about 5 feet.

The components

-Arduino, Lilypad micro controller

-Arduino, battery holder. 1.5v to 5v, with surge protector circuit

-Lilypad, Tri-light (RGB led)

-Lilypad, green LED

-Ultrasonic sensor

-Infrared, heat sensor

Putting it together

I began by using the wiring guides I found on the following web sites to solder it together. I didn’t proto-board it or alligator clips as I was confident in my soldering skills and wiring map to go for it! (cocky bastard!)

www.electrojoystick.com/#24EF8D This was the tutorial and sample code for the Maxbotix Sonar LV EZ1 ultrasonic device. I found the sample in out sensor code and used the tutorials on the blog and meetings to get it working and map out the flashing to be appropriate to the distance it represented.

This code worked perfectly on its own to start with:

/*

AnalogReadSerial

Reads an analog input on pin 0, prints the result to the serial monitor.

Attach the center pin of a potentiometer to pin A0, and the outside pins to +5V and ground.

This example code is in the public domain.

*/

int LEDdelay;

// the setup routine runs once when you press reset:

void setup() {

// initialize serial communication at 9600 bits per second:

Serial.begin(9600);

pinMode(10, OUTPUT);

}

// the loop routine runs over and over again forever:

void loop() {

// read the input on analog pin 0:

int sensorValue = analogRead(A3);

// print out the value you read:

Serial.println(sensorValue);

LEDdelay = map(sensorValue, 10, 380, 50, 500);

digitalWrite(10, HIGH);

delay(LEDdelay);

digitalWrite(10, LOW);

delay(LEDdelay);

delay(1);        // delay in between reads for stability

}

bildr.org/2011/02/mlx906#246CA2 This site got me wired in no time for the thermal sensor. The little infrared device is accurate to .02 degrees F! So if it mattered you can have a wicked degree of accuracy. These are commonly used in cars for the size and reliability and robotics. It is a very nice non-contact sensor indeed.

This site was a wealth of information but it leaves out the very important detail of pin association. In a nutshell, one must wire it according to the convention provided due to the internal components of the microcontroller. I had them wired on different pins and couldn’t get a reading. Thanks to Kate for getting me on track! I would have never figured that out. This was the only hardware hurdle I had. Once re-soldered it worked instantly.

Bellow is the code from the site.

#include <i2cmaster.h>

void setup(){

Serial.begin(9600);

i2c_init(); //Initialise the i2c bus

PORTC = (1 << PORTC4) | (1 << PORTC5);//enable pullups

}

void loop(){

int dev = 0x5A<<1;

int data_low = 0;

int data_high = 0;

int pec = 0;

i2c_start_wait(dev+I2C_WRITE);

i2c_write(0×07);

// read

i2c_rep_start(dev+I2C_READ);

data_low = i2c_readAck(); //Read 1 byte and then send ack

data_high = i2c_readAck(); //Read 1 byte and then send ack

pec = i2c_readNak();

i2c_stop();

//This converts high and low bytes together and processes temperature, MSB is a error bit and is ignored for temps

double tempFactor = 0.02; // 0.02 degrees per LSB (measurement resolution of the MLX90614)

double tempData = 0×0000; // zero out the data

int frac; // data past the decimal point

// This masks off the error bit of the high byte, then moves it left 8 bits and adds the low byte.

tempData = (double)(((data_high & 0x007F) << 8) + data_low);

tempData = (tempData * tempFactor)-0.01;

float celcius = tempData – 273.15;

float fahrenheit = (celcius*1.8) + 32;

Serial.print(“Celcius: “);

Serial.println(celcius);

Serial.print(“Fahrenheit: “);

Serial.println(fahrenheit);

delay(1000); // wait a second before printing again

}

The merging of the codes

That is a movie title for sure! I struggled quite a bit with tutorials and the like online and found they all had one thing in common, that they make assumptions as to the level of your knowledge going into this and that you have some basics… I do not. I had never been exposed to this before and was way out of my comfort zone. I understood the basics of code modifying, setup and loop (sort of) but anything I did with regards to following the wickedly confusing amount of information about coding didn’t work out and only lead to frustration and distain for the process. I had two functioning codes but couldn’t for the life of me figure out how to merge them.

I met with a classmate for an hour and we hammered it out. Borxu showed me how setup creates the conditions for the loop to happen. We transferred the commands and tried out samples along the way till it worked right. I assigned the appropriate pins and values to the sensors and the resulting merged code is bellow. It works like a charm! (I knew it would)

#include <i2cmaster.h>

int redPin = 9;                   // R petal on RGB LED module connected to digital pin 9

int greenPin = 10;     // G petal on RGB LED module connected to digital pin 10

int bluePin = 6;         // B petal on RGB LED module connected to digital pin 6

int distancePin = 11;   // flashlight pin

int LEDdelay;           // Delay for the distance light

void setup(){

Serial.begin(9600);

i2c_init(); //Initialise the i2c bus

PORTC = (1 << PORTC4) | (1 << PORTC5);//enable pullups

pinMode(redPin, OUTPUT);        // sets the redPin to be an output

pinMode(greenPin, OUTPUT);    // sets the greenPin to be an output

pinMode(bluePin, OUTPUT);      // sets the bluePin to be an output

pinMode(distancePin, OUTPUT); // sets the distancePin to be an output

}

void loop(){

// *** START IR Temperature Sensor Function ***

int dev = 0x5A<<1;

int data_low = 0;

int data_high = 0;

int pec = 0;

i2c_start_wait(dev+I2C_WRITE);

i2c_write(0×07);

// read

i2c_rep_start(dev+I2C_READ);

data_low = i2c_readAck(); //Read 1 byte and then send ack

data_high = i2c_readAck(); //Read 1 byte and then send ack

pec = i2c_readNak();

i2c_stop();

//This converts high and low bytes together and processes temperature, MSB is a error bit and is ignored for temps

double tempFactor = 0.02; // 0.02 degrees per LSB (measurement resolution of the MLX90614)

double tempData = 0×0000; // zero out the data

int frac; // data past the decimal point

// This masks off the error bit of the high byte, then moves it left 8 bits and adds the low byte.

tempData = (double)(((data_high & 0x007F) << 8) + data_low);

tempData = (tempData * tempFactor)-0.01;

float celcius = tempData – 273.15;

float fahrenheit = (celcius*1.8) + 32;

Serial.print(“Celcius: “);

Serial.println(celcius);

Serial.print(“Fahrenheit: “);

Serial.println(fahrenheit);

//  delay(1000); // wait a second before printing again

// *** END IR Temperature Sensor Function ***

// *** START Temperature Threshold Function ***

if (fahrenheit > 80) {

color(255, 0, 0);          // turn the RGB LED red

//          delay(1000);           // delay for 1 second

} else {

//          color(0,255, 0);       // turn the RGB LED green

//          delay(1000);           // delay for 1 second

color(0, 0, 255);          // turn the RGB LED blue

//          delay(1000);           // delay for 1 second

}

// *** START Distance Function ***

// read the input on analog pin 0:

int sensorValue = analogRead(A3);

// print out the value you read:

Serial.println(sensorValue);

LEDdelay = map(sensorValue, 10, 380, 100, 1000);

digitalWrite(distancePin, HIGH);

delay(LEDdelay);

digitalWrite(distancePin, LOW);

delay(LEDdelay);

delay(1);        // delay in between reads for stability

// *** END Distance Function ***

}

void color (unsigned char red, unsigned char green, unsigned char blue)     // the color generating function

{

analogWrite(redPin, 255-red);

analogWrite(bluePin, 255-blue);

analogWrite(greenPin, 255-green);

}

// *** END Temperature Threshold Function ***

Wearing the device

There are two considerations for this section, first being the personal aspects and the second being the social ramifications of wearing a Borg-like device.

I am personally comfortable wearing the device as my vision allows for it. I found others who looked through the device found the light to be too bright and distracting. The light can be further defused but more importantly what happens is something the military has coined “helmet fire.” Essentially helicopter pilots who use a wearable computer screen with inflight information being broadcast in one eye and real world vision in the other get confused easily in the heat of combat with the brains ability to process two images at once and can briefly shut down causing the helicopter to crash. It is a real problem. My limited vision lends me well to this technology but the signals need to be very deliberate hence the choice and sequence of colours listed bellow.

Blue light is connected to the thermal sensor and is on when a temperature of 80f or lower is detected. The blue light turns red when above 80f is detected. I used this number, as room temperature won’t set it off. It loves the stove and after some time you can map out the heat in the air with it! It will pick up a hot cup of coffee or body heat at close range of 2-3 feet.

The green LED flashes according to distance so the closer the object the quicker the flashing, simple enough but effective.

Socially wearing the device is another story. Of course here at OCAD-U it I easily accepted and met with great curiosity and fanfare but in public people don’t understand what it is. Hearing aids are well accepted for their sleek, tight form factor so that I am sure is a huge part of why people are uncomfortable with it. I have been asked most of all if the device is recording them. It has no camera or the capability to record any of the incoming information. But just like a hearing aid it provides what is missing and gives the wearer new information in a usable way.

Further development

For the visually impaired the uses are obvious but for the completely blind new outputs could be used like a hat with vibration motors in key locations. For the fully sighted individual this could act as a real time safety device in hazardous areas of work like monitoring air conditions or detecting land mines. A tighter form factor would make this more user friendly and acceptable. Batteries could be integrated, rechargeable and be made smaller, components could be better mapped out and tightened up, wires and traces could be strategically embedded and hidden and waterproofing the device would be greatly beneficial. The IR sensor can see through rain but the ultra sonic wont like driving rain, too much interference.

Closing remarks

This was a very challenging and personal project for me. The narrative has been a lifetime in the making and the skill set I learned to assemble and code the device is stronger than ever before. The seeing aid is more than the sum of its parts. The abilities it gives me makes my vision more complete but also acts as a window into our very complex social behaviors and notions of personal space. This is an ongoing experiment and has only begun with the creation of the device. I wish I did record for the best things it will see are the reactions of the people it encounters as I wear it but it will never know them.

Here are some pictures.

me wearing my seeing aid

Green flashes for distance and blue under 80F and red above

3D Printed Toddler – With Internal Bones Visible!.

Here is a picture taken of some clouds rolling across the sky getting ready to dump some much needed moisture. It rained briefly and about a half hour or so after it passed it was pretty much dry on the streets.

The other photo is from my friends cottage and shows some sheet lightning rolling across the northern shore of Georgian Bay here in Ontario in the spring. I have seen the remnants of water spouts there before also. Lots of weather up there to admire.

These clouds looked like the inspiration for some sci-fi effects. I love extreme weather but don’t get exposed to it as often as I like. Don’t get me wrong, sunny days are certainly preferred but it sure is amazing to see the weather process unfold. So much power.

Building on the modularity of the components, I added an accessories kit to add to the adaptability of the system and to top it off they all print without support just fine. It takes some time to get a useable amount but one could always scale the system to fit a given application. I tried to think of what would be fairly universal so I thought of plumbing and the connectors used in that industry.

It seems that my design caught the eye of a Thingiverse admin and has been featured! What’s even crazier is that as I write this it sits at the #5…oh wait looks like #4 position on the Thingiverse popular list! I watched it rise up over the weekend. I would never had guessed it would have been received with such fan fair! I want to see this on someones machine soon!

Here are some pictures of what I have so far. The first few pictures show some of the basic components and some of them together. The other picture is a screen shot of the popular page on Thingiverse. Check out my designs via these links and a big thanks to all who support me and my designs!

thingiverse.com/thing:25872

thingiverse.com/thing:26125

Here is what I found:

-First it was a fun thing to do on a Saturday afternoon with some coffee!!

-The cartridge bearing that supports the axle of the extruder motor had released some of the grease that it was packed with when it was originally assembled at the factory; I expected to see this when I took it apart. This could have caused slipping or contamination but it is difficult to tell as the drive gear was grease and debris free. While cleaning the grease was a nesseccay step as it had some plastic fragments in it and that could have lead to contamination later, I feel this is inconclusive but a worthy cleaning step never the less. A bit of acetone to wipe it clean off.

-Next I looked at the filament drive gear to make sure it was catching the filament properly. Simple enough but there wasn’t any debris in the hobbs to prevent engagement or to cause slippage. I gave it an acetone wipe also. Again, inconclusive but a worthy task. 

-Then I considered the spool jaming on the filament wind itself. It looked like as the filament came off the spool it was under itself causing drag. This could lead to the printer head lifting a small amount causing lack of fusion in layers, but my spool turns quite freely. Yet again inconclusive but I spent a second and fixed it easily.

So now I have run the same print and have had much better results. My regular amazing results I expect from my machine. I love my Makerbot Thing-o-Matic! I learn from it as much as I build with it and both experiences are so satisfying! Once again this machine astounds me at every print!

In this photo you can see the missing or malformed plastic.

This photo shows the resulting run after cleaning and a slight filament rewinding. Much better!

I blogged about a Rostock drawing machine a while back but here is a computer controlled version someone uploaded to thingiverse.com. There is a link to a video that you should see. This is what is so exciting about open source design. People are making and sharing these incredible things!

youtube.com/user/jcrocholl/videos?query=rostock

I made a chair for my furniture class that was around the idea of disability and our perceptions of what is “broken.” I designed a chair that only had three legs where it clearly should have four. It was the result of a combination of sketch models and research around disabilities, 3D printing organs, and stem cell technologies.

The link bellow is to a post that my friends at Makerbot Industries put up on their blog. I uploaded the chair project and all the details to thingiverse for others to enjoy and hopefully to have someone actually make one too!

http://www.makerbot.com/blog/2012/06/06/using-thingiverse-for-awareness/

Here is a picture of the completed chair.

I could not have done all this one year ago. I credit my school (obviously) but also the people at Makerbot. One day they said “me too” to 3D printing but wanted an affordable machine when compared to the $30,000+ price tag of the current state of art. Now they are leading the way in the table top manufacturing revolution!

I also said “me too!” Now with their support I am doing things I could never had guessed. My bot and I make regular appearances at my school for in class demos of what anybody can now do at home. I have also learned so much about 3D printing, not just file setup and modelling but the settings of the machine as it prints or generates a tool path. I can adjust them for each print allowing me an incredible level of control over my prints. this can not be said for many of the industry machines out there.

Anyhow…Bellow are a couple of images from my radial motor. There is one showing the body components being printed, The delicate looking but robust parts (thanks to my settings) being assembled and the completed motors. The Brown one was a second run and printed off so much better. The size difference pushed the limits of my TOM (Thing-O-Matic) and it took much longer to print all components but the results are so much nicer than the black version. It handled the overhangs better and the parts are rock solid. It is huge, the biggest thing I have printed off …yet!

This link is to Thingiverse, if you would like to see more pictures:

http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:21923

Here is a link to a video of it in action on the Youtubes!

youtu.be/f4uudyJQ32s