Applications and Implications.

Concept.

The scope of this week is to answer crytical questions regarding the final project that would promote longevity into the project, considering it may be reproduced or used by others in future, as well as breath meaning into it.

Q1: What will it do?

A small 5x5 cm light block can display a character, blink, or visualize anything on it's 5x5 led matrix screen. It is interactive and can communicate to nearby blocks, enabling scaling the amount of blocks by putting them together, one close to the other.

A possibility to display a variety of characters is enabled by the 25 LEDs.

Q2: Who has done what beforehand?

A big inspiration is drawn from the Automatiles project developed by Johnathan Bobrow at MIT University. In his thesis he documents where he draws his inspirations for the project, having a final scope to create an interactive board game that includes electronics.

Some important projects to mention:

Q3: What materials and components will be required?

Main components are defined by the functionality of the device.

The crytical component list for one electronic bloc:

25 X LEDS

1 X Attiny84 MCU

2 X SN74HC Shift Registers

4 X Infrared LEDS

4 X Infrared Tranceivers

1 X CR2477 1000mAh Battery

Q4: Where will they come from?

The components mentioned above can be purchased from large components retailers such as Reichelt or large online markets such as Ebay. The missing components come from the Fab Academy stock.

Q5: How much will it cost?

The goal is to achieve a price breakdown per each electronic block of 5 euros.

Some calculations reveal this as being very feasable:

25 LEDS ~ 1.24 euros

Attiny ~ 1.10 euros

IR LEDS ~ 0.64 euros

Transistors ~ 0.60 euros

SN74HCs ~ 0.70 euros

Battery ~ 1.35 euros

Total ~ 5.63 euros

Q6: What parts and systems will be made?

The main parts of the system that are intended to be made inside the lab are:

Top and Bottom PCB(printed circuit board) which will include all the eletronics

Top and Bottom casing of the cube, using molding and casting technique and 3D printing

Q7: What processes will be used?

Different parts of the system involve different processes:

Top and Bottom PCB - CNC milling; Electronic Design & Production;

Bottom Lid - 3D Printing;

Top Lid - Molding and Casting;

Bottom(Main) Electronic Board - Embedded Programming;

Q8: What tasks need to be completed?

IR Tranceiver Communication Between Boards standalone / Networking;

IR LED transmit/receive signal through Top Lid Wall / Sensor Testing and Trial;

Writing Library for 25 LED Matrix / Embedded Programming;

Shift Register Implementation for LED Matrix / Circuit and Board Layout Design;

Top and Bottom PCB producton / Circuit and Board Layout Design;

Producing one cast that is transparent and can be replicated for Top Lid / Molding Casting & CNC;

Choosing and mounting the right magnets for physical connection / Physical Design and Purchase;

Final Assembly and Testing;

Q9: What questions need to be answered?

Some crytical design questions need to be answered which could create a good base for the usability of the project such as:

How to make it easy for the user to display any visual pattern on the cube?

Which software/interface/platform is going to be used for that?

Where can these cubes can be implemented aside from a design visual perspective?

What other sensors can be attached to the cubes to increase their interaction?

Q10: What is the schedule?

From my experience, one can do maximum two big tasks a day, that is way a day is devided into two sections according to tasks above:

Q11: How will it be evaluated?

The evaluation will be according to the final interaction desired to achieve, meaning to have the blocks communicating to each other by using Infrared light as well as display different shapes according to the LED matrix.