This tutorial describes how to set up Eclipse for Arduino (AVR) C/C++ development. Eclipse is a full-featured Integrated Development Environment with modern editor features such as syntax highlighting, code completion and error checking. I became interested in using Eclipse for Arduino development as I’m often simultaneously developing firmware for the chip and visualization software in a Java / Processing applet. Since I’m already using Eclipse for Java / Processing, it’s nice to be able to work in the same environment for both.

The Arduino site has a decent walkthrough, but I found some of the steps to be confusing or outdated. Hopefully, this will get you up and running quickly. (more…)

For the 1-in-1 Project as part of ITP’s 30th anniversary celebration I over-engineering the simple bicycle blinky light. Why go for a simple, off-the-shelf blinky light when we can build a much more complicated one ourselves?!

I’m creating an animated display, which changes to solid red while braking.

Update: (5:26) It’s been a long night, but it all came together. I wish I could have finished at the floor, but sometimes you need to go to your cave. The bike blinky light is all I could have asked for…it’s obnoxious, it’s animated, it has a handlebar control to switch to a flashing warning mode. (more…)

(note: I’m awaiting the HR sensor, this is mostly outward forces)

I’m logging the acceleration forces at the handlebars of my bicycle while riding through New York City. The body has roughly three contact points with a bicycle, the hands at the handlebars, the “seat” at the saddle, and the feet at the pedals. The downward force of the rider’s weight and pedaling force and the upward forces of the bicycle rolling over uneven ground are distributed over these three points. I was interested to see just what kind of forces are “pushing back” that I may not be aware of, myself lost in the act of simply keeping the bicycle upright and safely navigating through traffic.

To contextualize the raw accelerometer data I also tracking GPS location and eventually geocoding the raw data in software. The bicycle sensors are being transmitted via Bluetooth to a mobile phone and the data is logged with a custom written (but now open-source!) python script. Below is the first draft of the visualization. (more…)

This is just a teaser for a project I’ve recently begun, but I had an “a-ha” moment when the visualization program finally came together just now and wanted to share…

This is geocoded accelerometer data from the handlebars of my bicycle on my commute from Greenpoint to ITP in the East Village. The sample at middle of the graph, and the red circle on the path coincide. I realized just now that this is a seam in the Williamsburg Bridge. Neat.

I’ll post proper documentation of the project as it becomes more robust…but I’m excited. Waiting for the heart rate monitor interface to arrive…looking to couple internal status with external events…

This is the final project presentation of BlindSight for the ITP Thinking Physically class in Spring 2009. BlindSight is is a collaboration between Robert Carlsen and Andrew Styer.

BlindSight aims to explore synesthesia by associating certain body positions with visual hallucinations induced by photic stimulation. In other words, flashing lights at various frequencies seems to cause visual patterns to appear for the viewer. Simple wearable sensors adjust the frequency of the flashes and thus provide various patterns. (more…)

This project aims to explore synesthesia by associating certain body positions with visual hallucinations induced by photic stimulation. In other words, flashing lights at various frequencies seems to cause visual patterns to appear for the viewer. Simple wearable sensors will adjust the frequency of the flashes and thus provide various patterns. Although the patterns may differ for each viewer, they seem to be the same for the viewer at a given frequency. (more…)

Alex and I have been developing the plans for the blocks in preparation for building the prototypes in the next week. For this, I built the community edition of QCad (open source FTW!) and have been teaching myself how to draw with it. There was a bit of a learning curve to the interface and the modal model of the application tools, but I’m now relatively comfortable with the basics. (more…)

Corey Menscher and I worked together on ThinkBig for the Whole Body Interface exercise in Thinking Physically. Corey had the basic idea of making soft switches which would be foot activated. Initially he was going to make three which you’d have to skip between. (more…)

While the Arduino IDE (Integrated Development Environment) is relatively simple way to program the Arduino hardware, I found myself getting frustrated by it’s limited features after spending time using Xcode and Eclipse. There are some simple tutorials available online which demonstrate how to set up Xcode for programming the Arduino, however these didn’t “just work” for me, and were targeting arduino-0.10.

I made a few (simple in hindsight) changes to the project which has worked well for me so far. (more…)

Following up on the initial post about the brauswitch – the eyebrow activated headband switch. Here is some video with a simple application demonstrating it’s use. There are separate switches for both the left and right sides. The simple Arduino code listed below will indicate if the left, right or both sides have been activated. A Processing sketch reads the serial output of the device and plays a variety of sound samples.

There is something really nice about the amplification of a small facial movement and the larger audio/visual response of the sketch. It’s also nice to interact in a handsfree way. Oh! Fun. Code after the video. (more…)