Schlagwort: lighting

  • This unique wall sconce welcomes you home with warm light

    This unique wall sconce welcomes you home with warm light

    Reading Time: 2 minutes

    Have you ever walked through your front door after a long day of work and realized that your home just isn’t as inviting as it seems like it should be? While it may not work miracles, some nice and welcoming lighting can make a big difference. That’s why Lauren Palazzi made this unique wall sconce called Acceptus that automatically turns on when it detects your arrival.

    Smart features aside, this is an intriguing design with a shape that generates interest all on its own. The wood base, carved in two pieces with a CNC router, has a profile that feels organic. Even before the light comes on, it projects warmth. The LED lighting on the internal perimeter enhances that effect with a soothing glow. Laser-cut acrylic “cover” panels on the front give the sconce a modern art vibe that is sure to appeal to many.

    The key smart feature of Acceptus is the presence detection, which lets it turn on the LED lighting when it senses your arrival. That works using an Arduino Nano ESP32 board that monitors an area, such as the entry way by the front door, through a PIR (passive infrared) motion sensor. That’s the same kind of sensor used for security floodlights and the technology is very reliable. When the Arduino “sees” movement through that PIR sensor, it uses a transistor to connect power to the LED strip.

    Palazzi recommends mounting Acceptus next to the door frame, opposite the hinges. That way, the movement of the door will activate the light. If you want to build your own Acceptus, Palazzi was kind enough to upload all of the necessary files to Instructables.

    The post This unique wall sconce welcomes you home with warm light appeared first on Arduino Blog.

    Website: LINK

  • Syncing tunes to Christmas tree lights with the Arduino Opta

    Syncing tunes to Christmas tree lights with the Arduino Opta

    Reading Time: 2 minutes

    We all know that one neighbor who always goes the extra mile when decorating for the holidays, and after taking inspiration from these large displays of light and sound, Marcelo Arredondo, Andres Sabas, and Andrea ZGuz of the Electronic Cats crew decided to build a smaller version for their Christmas tree using the Arduino Opta micro PLC.

    The team chose to create their music-synchronized light show with the Opta because of its reliability and bank of four built-in relays that could be utilized to switch specific light strings on or off. Lining up and triggering certain lighting effects for the music was all handled through the open-source Vixen Lights software. In here, the Opta was configured as a quad-channel controller that receives its commands over a GPIO connection sent by an Arduino UNO mediator. The PLC is programmed visually to read a programmable input pin for each relay and then leverage a comparator to toggle the relay when the signal is high.

    Back in the Vixen Light software, the team imported their favorite Christmas song and began the process of charting it. First, they generated markers over the audio waveform to signify the beats and overall tempo. Next, various effects were added to the timeline which trigger the lighting channels in a particular sequence. Lastly, the UNO was flashed with a sketch that allowed it to read the incoming Serial data from Vixen over USB and then toggle its digital outputs for the Opta to register.

    [youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ES7W_O3CeZk?feature=oembed&w=500&h=281]

    More information about this project can be found in its write-up here on Hackster.io.

    The post Syncing tunes to Christmas tree lights with the Arduino Opta appeared first on Arduino Blog.

    Website: LINK

  • ECLIPSE is a beautiful ring lamp that lightens progressively

    ECLIPSE is a beautiful ring lamp that lightens progressively

    Reading Time: 2 minutes

    Have you ever exited a dark movie theater in the middle of the afternoon and found yourself blinded by the sudden transition to bright sunlight? Etienne Leroy faces the same problem after watching a movie on his home projector and turning on the lights. Because those lights are intense and instantly come on at full brightness, the transition can be very harsh. To increase comfort, he designed a ring-shaped lamp that lightens progressively.

    ECLIPSE is a ring-shaped lamp that shines its light upon the wall onto which it is mounted. When activated, it gradually increased the brightness of the light in order to avoid a jarring transition after movie time. There are no longer any worries about hurt eyes and the lamp looks gorgeous, so it adds to the home’s decor instead of detracting from it. Best of all, ECLIPSE is easy and affordable to build if you want your own.

    The lamp’s frame is printable in small sections that should fit on most consumer 3D printers. Illumination comes from a strip of “warm white” LEDs, though it would be easy to substitute another color or even RGB LEDs. An Arduino Nano controls those LEDs, increasing brightness slowly over a set period of time. It uses an infrared receiver module, so users can take advantage of the remotes they already own and have handy to turn the ECLIPSE lamp on. It will work with any infrared remote and the user only needs to decode the specific code sent by their remote when they press the desired button.

    The post ECLIPSE is a beautiful ring lamp that lightens progressively appeared first on Arduino Blog.

    Website: LINK

  • A hand-following AI task lamp for your desk

    A hand-following AI task lamp for your desk

    Reading Time: < 1 minute

    A hand-following AI task lamp for your desk

    Arduino Team — July 15th, 2020

    As you work on a project, lighting needs change dynamically. This can mean manual adjustment after manual adjustment, making do with generalized lighting, or having a helper hold a flashlight. Harry Gao, however, has a different solution in the form of a novel robotic task lamp.

    Gao’s 3D-printed device uses a USB camera to take images of the work area, and a Python image processing routine running on a PC to detect hand positions. This sends instructions to an Arduino Nano, which commands a pair of small stepper motors to extend and rotate the light fixture via corresponding driver boards.

    The solution means that he’ll always have proper illumination, as long as he stays within the light-bot’s range!

    [youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yNJGleCFyB8?feature=oembed&w=500&h=281]

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    Website: LINK

  • An interactive wall map with DMX programmable lights and visual ‘narration’

    An interactive wall map with DMX programmable lights and visual ‘narration’

    Reading Time: 2 minutes

    An interactive wall map with DMX programmable lights and visual ‘narration’

    Arduino Team — September 26th, 2019

    Non-profits can do great work, and in order to help others visualize the needs they serve and what they are doing, Jason Wolin came up with an amazing map for his organization.

    The massive map stretches down 14 feet of a brick wall, with the continents cut out of MDF, and a pair of accompanying LCD TVs that show data about different areas.

    Three computers are used for control, two of which are used to play videos on each screen. The third handles overhead map lighting controlled via the DMX protocol to illuminate the map in various configurations. Each of the PCs are coordinated using a trio of Arduino Nanos, allowing video and lighting effects to be displayed in perfect sync.

    [youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f5Fjqk-rGuk?feature=oembed&w=500&h=281]

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    Website: LINK

  • Synchronized bike lighting inspired by nature

    Synchronized bike lighting inspired by nature

    Reading Time: 2 minutes

    Synchronized bike lighting inspired by nature

    Arduino Team — June 18th, 2019

    Having a light on your bike at night is important for safety, but what if those headlights could talk to others sharing the road with you? Well now it can, using the [Bike] Swarm by Alex Berke, Thomas Sanchez, and Kent Larson from the MIT Media Lab.

    Their device—or collection of devices—controls a bicycle’s lighting via an Arduino and LED driver, and features an nRF24L01 wireless module to communicate with others in the vicinity. When another rider is encountered, the bikes sync their lights up automatically. 

    The team has already designed and fabricated prototypes, then strapped them onto local city bike share program bikes for testing. 

    It’s an interesting effect when two bikes pass, but as shown in the video below, things get much more fascinating when a handful of bikes can coordinate both their direction and light pattern.

    [youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wUl-CHJ6DK0?feature=oembed&w=500&h=281]

    As bikes navigate city streets after dark, they are often equipped with lights. The lights make the bikes visible to cars or other bikers, and the hazards of traffic less dangerous.

    Imagine that as solitary bikes come together, their lights begin to pulsate at the same cadence. The bikers may not know each other, or may only be passing each other briefly, but for the moments they are together, their lights synchronize. The effect is a visually united presence, as groups of bikes illuminate themselves with a gently pulsing, collective light source.

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    Website: LINK

  • Augmented-reality projection lamp with Raspberry Pi and Android Things

    Augmented-reality projection lamp with Raspberry Pi and Android Things

    Reading Time: 3 minutes

    If your day has been a little fraught so far, watch this video. It opens with a tableau of methodically laid-out components and then shows them soldered, screwed, and slotted neatly into place. Everything fits perfectly; nothing needs percussive adjustment. Then it shows us glimpses of an AR future just like the one promised in the less dystopian comics and TV programmes of my 1980s childhood. It is all very soothing, and exactly what I needed.

    Android Things – Lantern

    Transform any surface into mixed-reality using Raspberry Pi, a laser projector, and Android Things. Android Experiments – http://experiments.withgoogle.com/android/lantern Lantern project site – http://nordprojects.co/lantern check below to make your own ↓↓↓ Get the code – https://github.com/nordprojects/lantern Build the lamp – https://www.hackster.io/nord-projects/lantern-9f0c28

    Creating augmented reality with projection

    We’ve seen plenty of Raspberry Pi IoT builds that are smart devices for the home; they add computing power to things like lights, door locks, or toasters to make these objects interact with humans and with their environment in new ways. Nord Projects‘ Lantern takes a different approach. In their words, it:

    imagines a future where projections are used to present ambient information, and relevant UI within everyday objects. Point it at a clock to show your appointments, or point to speaker to display the currently playing song. Unlike a screen, when Lantern’s projections are no longer needed, they simply fade away.

    Lantern is set up so that you can connect your wireless device to it using Google Nearby. This means there’s no need to create an account before you can dive into augmented reality.

    Lantern Raspberry Pi powered projector lamp

    Your own open-source AR lamp

    Nord Projects collaborated on Lantern with Google’s Android Things team. They’ve made it fully open-source, so you can find the code on GitHub and also download their parts list, which includes a Pi, an IKEA lamp, an accelerometer, and a laser projector. Build instructions are at hackster.io and on GitHub.

    This is a particularly clear tutorial, very well illustrated with photos and GIFs, and once you’ve sourced and 3D-printed all of the components, you shouldn’t need a whole lot of experience to put everything together successfully. Since everything is open-source, though, if you want to adapt it — for example, if you’d like to source a less costly projector than the snazzy one used here — you can do that too.

    components of Lantern Raspberry Pi powered augmented reality projector lamp

    The instructions walk you through the mechanical build and the wiring, as well as installing Android Things and Nord Projects’ custom software on the Raspberry Pi. Once you’ve set everything up, an accelerometer connected to the Pi’s GPIO pins lets the lamp know which surface it is pointing at. A companion app on your mobile device lets you choose from the mini apps that work on that surface to select the projection you want.

    The designers are making several mini apps available for Lantern, including the charmingly named Space Porthole: this uses Processing and your local longitude and latitude to project onto your ceiling the stars you’d see if you punched a hole through to the sky, if it were night time, and clear weather. Wouldn’t you rather look at that than deal with the ant problem in your kitchen or tackle your GitHub notifications?

    What would you like to project onto your living environment? Let us know in the comments!

    Website: LINK