Hi there! I just wanted produce a blog post on my final project for the year.
For my final project of the year, I built a light up speaker. However I just did another blog post about that! This one is a little bit different...
For starters, this speaker is much larger(even though the cost of the part was around the same). The speakers alone will pull up to 200 watts from the wall(however I have limited it to around 100 so I don't damage any components and save my hearing). There are about 100 neopixel leds on the project, so the light count is higher as well. However, numbers don't mean anything. The best feature of this speaker is how you connect to it!
The speaker utilizes a Raspberry Pi microcomputer to act as the brains of the machine. This raspberry pi allows the speaker to be controlled via a web interface(however it should remain behind a firewall as port forwarding is not a good idea, unless you want some to play random music on your raspberry pi, or really take over your network for that matter). This web interface allows you to choose music from various music hosting websites such as Spotify, soundcloud and TuneIn.
How did I do that? Well, I actually dislike sitting at a desk and programming for more than 2-4 hours at a time, and I'm definantly not experienced enough to program this entirely by myself. So I used cool framework called mopidy, which basically runs the backend of the server, and handles all the tasks of streaming and finding the music. All I did was install it using the terminal, and configure the settings and modify the exiting interface, and set it to boot on startup. But still, it's pretty awesome that I can just on any browser and type the internal ip the the speaker and change the music!!
So this is gonna be a shorter blog post, but I would just like to have a quick post about my mini light up speaker!
So, I started this project 3 weeks before the end of school, looking for something small to perfect my combination of neopixel lights and music to make an enriching experience. I had planned to finish the project in 4-5 hours, and only spend 60$ on the parts. But I realized how hard smaller electronics for audio are to work with inside a jar, and spent about 100$ on the projects. I went through 2 Arduino Nanos, accidentally putting the pins in the wrong spot, and pulling more power than the Arduino could deliver. The same scenario with the neopixels I used the project, killing about 60 neopixels before fixing it. The primary reason I even continued working on it was because I really wanted to give a gift to someone, and I decided that I wanted to give them this. Finally, after 20 hours of working the project, I finished building it. And the video is below!!
So, I figured I should write a blog post for one of parts of my genius project : my RC car. Well, here it goes!
The Nitro RC car was the most fun project. During the construction process, I spent literally months researching the necessary parts. A little background, I was very into cars as a kid. And I loved learning how they work. I read tons of car and computer books during my childhood, and some of it stayed with me. I did however need to relearn a lot of new concepts, and adjust my mindset for the smaller scale. I spent much more time researching parts, concepts, records and mechanics to fully understand how Nitro RC cars work that spent on actually building and modifying the car.
The construction process was relatively short and painless. I didn't completely fabricate more of my parts. Instead, I used amazon and other hobbyist websites to order my individual parts. The majority of the parts were compatible, and the parts that weren't were by design, as I did fabricate some of my own solutions to keep the project as 'cheap' as possible. Total cost of the project is around 350$, which might seem like much. But most RC nitro cars range from 300$-1000s$. Some examples of objects I fabricated myself is I 3D printed body panels around the car to project it from bumps. I used roller skating bearings for my front and rear wheels to decrease friction, increasing the amount of power put on the wheels. I painted most of the parts black to keep a consistent color scheme. I bought roughly 20 different springs and 10 different types of shocks trying to find the perfect balance between off-reading capability and steering performance. I tuned the Nitro, trying to find the perfect mixture of air-fuel, to produce the best performance and reliability for the motor. I modified the servos and steering.
The entire system uses an Arduino, with a receiver and transmitter on both the RC cars and the ground to control the nitro RC car. The reason I replaced the entire system is because I mounted RGB LEDs all over the Nitro car to enrich the viewing experience, and I noticed that the throttle response on the (unmodifiable) remote and receiver combo I bought didn't align with the throttle management. The Remote gave me direct control over the vehicle, meaning I would have to accommodate how the car puts power down, and steers in real time. So if I put my finger on the trigger too quickly, the rush of air into the vehicle sometimes cause the motor to stall, or put down so much power that I would lose control over the vehicle. I realized that I wanted control that would be smoother than my hand could deliver, and would make decisions over how to put the power down. So using an 2 nanos and 2 wifi modules, I built a system where one nano with a wifi chip would replace the electronics in the transmitter, send the steering and throttle information over to my computer, which would use processing(which I know is slow, but I have a slow reaction time so I didn't notice it) to take that signal, process it so that the vehicle would be easier to control, and send it to the nano chip on board the RC car.
Here's a clip of the vehicle, sorry I didn't show how the receiver and transmitter worked. The code wasn't entirely done by me so I don't have a complete understanding of it, but it made a world of a difference. Before, I had a tendency to constantly adjust my steering, and I would put my finger on the throttle too quickly, causing spinouts, unwanted burnouts and engine stalls. Now the vehicle is controllable enough for me to use(even though I crashed it @ the end of the video)
Good morning. I would like produce an article to address my electric house project. This project was initially used for my Physics class. The initial objective was to build a box that would light up, and be controlled by a switch. That was the requirement for the class. I needed to simulate a room with lights and switches.
(Here is a picture)
Instead... I decided to built something... a bit more extravagant. I like to refer to my project a 'mini-club'. The initial project requirements only needed 6 lights. I decided to go for roughly 150. To control of those lights, I used 3 microcontrollers (2x Arduino mega, 1x Arduino Uno). To be honest, I could have rewritten the program to work entirely on one Arduino, and use less wires, but I wasn't aware of a solution I could be with only 30$
(This isn't the final built, but it was the only one on hand)
Finally, (while I can't show you now) the box lit up and interacted with audio. The lights flashed to the music. I surpassed the objectives of my class by a wide margin, but I thought it would be a fun project. I created a fun, interactive box that enriches the music listening experience.
Final Reflections
I learned a lot from this project. My knowledge of electronics has be improved. My ability to use spray paint has improved. Design, wiring, and stylizing skills have all been improved. However, those are all skills I can learn further on in life. Something I learned from this project was focus and determination. I learned how to focus on one project for 3 weeks straight. I feel like I can tackle projects vastly larger than before. It's the one takeaway from the entire project I am most proud of.
Hello, so just a quick update. I am working hard to finish up my genius project. I did a lot, but there's still quite a bit to do. Hopefully a new video will be up by tonight(if not 2). I have repaired my electric house, and it is now ready to be filmed. I am also working on a couple of other projects that are being worked on.
So yea, that's all for now! I am hopeful that I will complete the project on time.
Hey there! So I felt like I needed to give myself an explanation as to why I put my expedition videos in place. Well... basically the reason why is because I have realized I haven't produced enough content to fill up the entire genius project. I hope to produce a few more videos until then, but just to make sure I have enough content, here you go. I'm gonna show each video, and give information about said video.
Video 1 : "A Gouda Adventure"
When producing this video, I was not an inexperienced filmmaker, but it was the first time I have ever worked with a group so closely in one of my videos. Not only that, I also didn't get as much time to work on the project, with only about 5 days to complete the entire project. Nevertheless the end result was enjoyable to watch. This project had many 'firsts' for me. It was the first time I used anything more than the stock lenses, using 1.4 and 1.8 primes lenses. It was the first time I used the latest adobe premiere. It was the first time I worked with active lighting to enhance the scene(along with other cool equipment). Finally, it was the first video I have produced with a script. All previous videos only used a shot list of some kind. So, all in all it was a film to experiment with, and it has serve it's purpose to teach me.. Onto the next video!!
Oh and P.S, here's the behind the scenes for that video.
Video 2 : The Future:
This film, was probably the most stressful of all the films I produced. It took a lot of time, and (in my opinion) didn't give as much enjoyment as any of the previous videos. I cite my main issue as being creative differences between me and a fellow classmate. We are friends, but we have different approaches to filmmaking, decreasing efficiency. But, it did teach me how I should work with people I don't agree with. Anyways... onto the actual film
This video is probably the most inconsistent out of all the videos I have produced. The first three scenes were pretty good, with advanced cinematography and effective visual storytelling. However the last two scenes kind of deter the overall experience. Watch it and see the differences between the scenes. Anyways... onto the next film!!
Video 3 : Animal vs Animal vs Human
This film makes no sense to those who haven't watched the previous animal vs animal vs human videos. Basically we interview the people who created the video and they explain the experience. This is probably the video with the most preproduction and the least amount of visual effects and color grading. Still though.. we won best cinematography so there is that...
The film was recorded on two cameras. And to improve audio quality, we used a condenser mic I bought for music production a year ago. The scene was lit with 5 construction lights(plus the lights already in the room). It took a lot of time to edit. We had 200gb of footage, with about 5-6 hours of footage to look through. This film taught me how to make an interview effectively(even though most people wont understand it). Now onto the final video!!
4th and final Video : AvAvH 3 : Catbear
So this video piece is the most time consuming video I have produced. However, it's also the coolest video(because of fighting and explosions). Unfortunately, all the time spent during filming and post-production really took away the amount of time we spent on a script. The amount of time spent writing a script: 2 minutes. The amount of time editing the video : 100 hours. The visual effects for this video took a lot of time due to it's difficult nature. Every gunshot had to be color corrected and placed in the right spot.
Final Reflections
So, from all the videos. I would say that the most important thing I learned, was probably group coordination and leadership skills. As for all the technical details and visual storytelling aspects, I pushed myself to greater limits in my cinematography and visual storytelling skills, but I didn't improve my visual effects skills. I still feel like I have learned how to integrate myself into a group, increasing efficiency and enjoyment. Before this expeditions, I was an avid filmmaker. But I only worked with 1-2 people during the production of all my prior videos, so coordination and communication was much more simple. During expeditions, I had to learn how to manage 5-7 people in my group(not including myself). This involved a lot of yelling initially, but eventually I had to find the strengths and comfort levels with everyone in my team, so I could best optimize their workload. It took a lot of time to figure out solutions to the many personal problems on set.
As for what I felt like I should've done differently. I feel like I worked a lot of people way too hard in the first 2 expeditions, and I put them way past their comfort zone. I think I would have set lower expectations for people(not everyone has 4 years of filmmaking experience), and put a higher workload on myself. I also feel like I should've spent more time writing the story to all of the films I produced this year. Most of the stories are quite fragmented, and didn't exactly make sense. The final video didn't really even have a story. But all in all, It was an excellent experience I'm happy to have had.
Anyways, that wraps up all the videos. They all took a lot more time than they should have, and I wish I had done them differently... But I'm glad I made them and I hope you enjoy them too!!!
So, after reviewing my previous posts. I have decided I really want to try starting over(with only 1.5 weeks to spare!!)
and redoing my blog posts. And with starting over the blog posts, I would also like to show how my genius project has changed...
Changes Changes..
First of all, I would like to state that my entire genius project has been revamped. I have changed the topic of my project, so I am no longer documenting other people's stories. Instead I decided to document what I spend my free time on, which happens to be projects! Alongside this, I decided to bring in my expedition videos as part of my project to showcase my work.
Next, I would also like to point out that the interface for my blog has changed greatly. It has been redesigned to look as elegant as possible while being capable of delivering the content in an organized and efficient manner.
Finally, I would like to state that my current progress is actually quite minimal. I have the vast majority of my projects ready to be recorded, but documentations hasn't occurred yet and that even though I have 2 weeks to finish my project, I will be working hard to document more of my projects...
Progress update!!
Okay, so now lets get to the nitty gritty details. As for projects, the self driving RC car never happened... Instead I built a nitro powered RC car. I built a box that light's up to music. I am currently building a 200 watt Bluetooth speaker that lights up. I have also produced some videos. Finally I have been producing this blog, and trying to get everything working...
What do you need to do before your presentation? - I need to do a loooot of things. First of all, I have been slacking in the video and website department. My website isn’t written, and I have an insufficient amount of videos. Then, I’m still working on another part of my genius project. What are you nervous about for your presentation? - I am most nervous about my presentation in that I already have a lot of things to work on, and adding this onto it only creates additional work I didn't think about. What has been your favorite part of your Genius Project so far? Why? - My favorite part of my genius project is being graded on what I do for fun!!! Talk about the process of writing a blog. Has it been helpful in reflecting about your progress in your project? Why or why not? - The process of writing a blog has been tedious. I have been inconsistent for a while… and I need to catch up. .
I am building a RC car that drives itself. It will use a raspberry pi as the communication between the cloud(servers either offsite or at my house) and the Arduino sensors/servos. For servos, we use a series of servo and stepper motors to control steering, and throttle positions. For sensors, we use LIDAR for tracking the world around us, including mobile and static objects.
I have produced about 3-4 videos since I last updated my posts. Here they are.
I have produced other videos since then, and hope to pursue more content production as time goes on
Question Answering
1. I am doing better than my last blog post, I have produced 6 videos. I hope to produce many more videos as time goes on.
2. I have actually produced videos since the last post. Before, I had only written a website and scripts for the videos.
and I have delegated certain tasks to my partner effectively.
I am quite proud of the quality of video since my last posts.
I will present what I think was my best video and some information that I learned during the process
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