Thoughts on new project idea?

[large_ghostman]

I was wittering away in this thread https://www.electro-tech-online.com/threads/mplabx-and-code-configurator.147074/#post-1249666

I mentioned my sound and light project etc etc and had a brain wave! So to explain fully........................

Two things everyone and the dog knows at the moment are I am doing exams and want to mess with sound and light for a fun project. Also I erm 'home school' for some lessons like Art and PE, I had to take Art because the timetable I chose left a gap and it was the lesser of available evils. I cant draw or paint and I am certainly more Autistic than Artistic! So I didnt do my Art exam, in fact the only time I enter the Art block is to liberate some fine wet and dry paper for tech class.

Now technically I have to resit my Art exam in a few weeks time, I had decided to just not turn up again as i will be dropping the subject next year. While writing in the above thread and mentioning that I didnt have a clue what I was going to do but all I knew was I wanted to do a sound and light project (I have mentioned it a couple of times). Well Bingo....... I read the art exam brief for the practical and it says the following.

"Using a media of your choice express or interpret a stimulus in an artistic manner"

Well to be honest i didnt really get the question let alone have an answer! From what I have heard from some in my group they have been told things like, "Take something that does or could cause a stimulus (the example given was pain) and paint a picture that depicts that pain"

It wasnt the only example given but you get the drift, so it suddenly occurred to me I might actually be able to do the exam praticle and get a decent grade!! That would be so funny its worth it just to see the teachers face lol.

So see what you think of this light bulb moment from the other thread.

Some years ago I posted about buying a Chinese lazer off ebay, after searching around I became convinced what I had brought as a 1mW laser was in fact around 5mW, I had also got some special mirrors from an old over head projector, these are designed for lasers but are a funny shape.
I didnt do anything with the laser or mirrors in the end, but now I am thinking kill two birds one stone.

So the idea is to play music from say the laptop, but before the signal gets to the amplified speakers I could tap into the signal with opamps and use the signals with some band pass filters. Then I could use some servos and old pc fans to move some old CD's stuck onto the fan hubs, I dont have the skill or nerve to cut the mirrors I have so I am thinking use CD's instead to reflect the laser.

So in essence a sound to light laser show, to me this fits the brief (if I squint a bit) and means I have a sound and light project to do . I can take precautions with the laser and make sure it points at the wall etc when marked. With a bit of luck I could get the laser to write a message on the wall before the music starts and then the 'user' can use buttons and pots to alter the filters etc and get different effects, i will also have some presets done.

So what do you think? Rather than use a mic I am thinking of using the headphone out and sampling the signal via opamp before it goes into some speakers i have that fit into the head phone jack. I think if I do it right and choose some good music it might be pretty cool, I have no idea when the resit is (havnt bothered looking) but i know its before end of march. I have the laser still (I think) and have loads of pc fans I can mount on servos, then stick the non shiny side of the cd to the spinning fan hub. If the fans are standing up and I use two servos per fan and 3-5 fans, i should be able to get some good effects with filters and a micro or two, I could just use the PI for the sound side and then use a some adjustable filters and a couple of pics to alter the spinning rate and control the servos etc.

To me that would be an Artistic interpretation of music (a stimulus) using light (my media) . Would also be really interesting to do, first thing I guess is to get a free copy of some software to look at the spectrum of a few songs, from there work out what filter ranges i need. Ideas comments?

the best bit is this [project I can document live over the next few weeks while I build it :d, dosnt matter if I fail the exam but would be cool to pass after going to 2 lessons all year

 

[gophert]

I was wittering away in this thread https://www.electro-tech-online.com/threads/mplabx-and-code-configurator.147074/#post-1249666

I mentioned my sound and light project etc etc and had a brain wave! So to explain fully........................

Two things everyone and the dog knows at the moment are I am doing exams and want to mess with sound and light for a fun project. Also I erm 'home school' for some lessons like Art and PE, I had to take Art because the timetable I chose left a gap and it was the lesser of available evils. I cant draw or paint and I am certainly more Autistic than Artistic! So I didnt do my Art exam, in fact the only time I enter the Art block is to liberate some fine wet and dry paper for tech class.

Now technically I have to resit my Art exam in a few weeks time, I had decided to just not turn up again as i will be dropping the subject next year. While writing in the above thread and mentioning that I didnt have a clue what I was going to do but all I knew was I wanted to do a sound and light project (I have mentioned it a couple of times). Well Bingo....... I read the art exam brief for the practical and it says the following.

"Using a media of your choice express or interpret a stimulus in an artistic manner"

Well to be honest i didnt really get the question let alone have an answer! From what I have heard from some in my group they have been told things like, "Take something that does or could cause a stimulus (the example given was pain) and paint a picture that depicts that pain"

It wasnt the only example given but you get the drift, so it suddenly occurred to me I might actually be able to do the exam praticle and get a decent grade!! That would be so funny its worth it just to see the teachers face lol.

So see what you think of this light bulb moment from the other thread.

Some years ago I posted about buying a Chinese lazer off ebay, after searching around I became convinced what I had brought as a 1mW laser was in fact around 5mW, I had also got some special mirrors from an old over head projector, these are designed for lasers but are a funny shape.
I didnt do anything with the laser or mirrors in the end, but now I am thinking kill two birds one stone.

So the idea is to play music from say the laptop, but before the signal gets to the amplified speakers I could tap into the signal with opamps and use the signals with some band pass filters. Then I could use some servos and old pc fans to move some old CD's stuck onto the fan hubs, I dont have the skill or nerve to cut the mirrors I have so I am thinking use CD's instead to reflect the laser.

So in essence a sound to light laser show, to me this fits the brief (if I squint a bit) and means I have a sound and light project to do . I can take precautions with the laser and make sure it points at the wall etc when marked. With a bit of luck I could get the laser to write a message on the wall before the music starts and then the 'user' can use buttons and pots to alter the filters etc and get different effects, i will also have some presets done.

So what do you think? Rather than use a mic I am thinking of using the headphone out and sampling the signal via opamp before it goes into some speakers i have that fit into the head phone jack. I think if I do it right and choose some good music it might be pretty cool, I have no idea when the resit is (havnt bothered looking) but i know its before end of march. I have the laser still (I think) and have loads of pc fans I can mount on servos, then stick the non shiny side of the cd to the spinning fan hub. If the fans are standing up and I use two servos per fan and 3-5 fans, i should be able to get some good effects with filters and a micro or two, I could just use the PI for the sound side and then use a some adjustable filters and a couple of pics to alter the spinning rate and control the servos etc.

To me that would be an Artistic interpretation of music (a stimulus) using light (my media) . Would also be really interesting to do, first thing I guess is to get a free copy of some software to look at the spectrum of a few songs, from there work out what filter ranges i need. Ideas comments?

the best bit is this [project I can document live over the next few weeks while I build it :d, dosnt matter if I fail the exam but would be cool to pass after going to 2 lessons all year

Quite ambitious. You have sound, filters, amplifiers, speakers, then projections bits (laser and fans converted to servos and CDs reflecting said laser light to an image.

You might have more luck and less effort with some rgb LEDs and a back-light diffusion screen from a scrapped 30" or bigger TV (or even a diffuser from a fluorescent light). Anyhow, use your idea to break the light out to frequency bins (LED color) and power of each bin (brightness of the color).

If you have 5 to 9 RGB LEDs, you could make the color assigned to each frequency hop from LED TO LED to the beat of the music. Glass mechanicals (fans/projection/etc). If you want more movement, you could put a CD or other detracting lens over/near each RGB LED to make it move.

 

[large_ghostman]

Quite ambitious. You have sound, filters, amplifiers, speakers, then projections bits (laser and fans converted to servos and CDs reflecting said laser light to an image.

You might have more luck and less effort with some rgb LEDs and a back-light diffusion screen from a scrapped 30" or bigger TV (or even a diffuser from a fluorescent light). Anyhow, use your idea to break the light out to frequency bins (LED color) and power of each bin (brightness of the color).

If you have 5 to 9 RGB LEDs, you could make the color assigned to each frequency hop from LED TO LED to the beat of the music. Glass mechanicals (fans/projection/etc). If you want more movement, you could put a CD or other detracting lens over/near each RGB LED to make it move.

This is kind of what I had in mind

To control the patterns I was just going to use simple band pass filters and a micro to control the mirror position and speed etc, I cant see it being too hard and i have most the parts. The PI plays pretty good music and I have a small amplifier and speakers that would fit it, or just use a laptop. Its an Art project I wouldnt get out of bed to do it for leds!!
I will give it two weeks spare time dev work, if I make progress i will go ahead and if not I wont do the exam .

I have a handy filter box in the lab, so I can try alot of it out with the signal generator and filter box, moving the servos in both axis and with both position and speed determined by different frequencies etc should be cool, add in the fan speed controlled by another set of frequencies and it should be good.
The last project used alot of servos so it shouldnt be too hard with a couple of micros and the ADC, I might have a go Thursday Night in the lab with the sig gen and filter box. First I need to find some free software to look at the music files I want to use, then I can choose my bands and try them by sweeping the generator through those frequencies (good job I didnt sell my decent sig generator!). I like the RGB idea, but I doubt I can get two chepo Chinese laser here in time, all they have to do is sit still and point at the mirrors (CD's)

 

[gophert]

This is kind of what I had in mind

To control the patterns I was just going to use simple band pass filters and a micro to control the mirror position and speed etc, I cant see it being too hard and i have most the parts. The PI plays pretty good music and I have a small amplifier and speakers that would fit it, or just use a laptop. Its an Art project I wouldnt get out of bed to do it for leds!!
I will give it two weeks spare time dev work, if I make progress i will go ahead and if not I wont do the exam .

I have a handy filter box in the lab, so I can try alot of it out with the signal generator and filter box, moving the servos in both axis and with both position and speed determined by different frequencies etc should be cool, add in the fan speed controlled by another set of frequencies and it should be good.
The last project used alot of servos so it shouldnt be too hard with a couple of micros and the ADC, I might have a go Thursday Night in the lab with the sig gen and filter box. First I need to find some free software to look at the music files I want to use, then I can choose my bands and try them by sweeping the generator through those frequencies (good job I didnt sell my decent sig generator!). I like the RGB idea, but I doubt I can get two chepo Chinese laser here in time, all they have to do is sit still and point at the mirrors (CD's)

Ah, I thought you were thinking about a full raster image with the laser. That is super easy - I like it. I approve and give you permission to move forward.

 

[large_ghostman]

Ah, I thought you were thinking about a full raster image with the laser. That is super easy - I like it. I approve and give you permission to move forward.

See thats why I fire off ideas here first , that way i can adjust how I say something until its understood , for an art project I think it would be cool. Although this one was done on the X Y of an oscilloscope its more my thing

Now I know how its donr frequency wise I could work the patterns out first with Matlab and then create the sound file, use it as kind of intro then go into a short song , I might have a look and see how much Green and blue laser are in the uk. but a single one will do. Back up plan will be take a scope in lol and do it this way even easier then lmao. Trust me my art teacher is easily impressed (thinks a electric pencil sharpener is voodoo) , everyone else will be doing collages with leaves etc, or maybe even like last years winner............take in a bin bag of leaves and rustle them about .

One of the two lessons I did attend we did finger painting

 

[large_ghostman]

Hmm now I am thinking rather than stationary laser's I could put piezo electric dooh dahs like you make drum kits with and vibrate them, that way i could aim for something like this

 

[gophert]

Hmm now I am thinking rather than stationary laser's I could put piezo electric dooh dahs like you make drum kits with and vibrate them, that way i could aim for something like this

Those are some cool projects - I look forward to seeing yours!

 

[large_ghostman]

Still at the thinking stage! Now I know how its done I will work on how to transfer off the scope onto a movable laser bed, piezo for some bits but maybe electro magnet bolts with springs in for wider movement, should be able to take the frequency ok. I will start with the scope to make sure I have the concept right then start making the laser stuff .

I actually like this project better than the hexapod lol, I will probably use the R PI for the sound/signal generation. Nothing is concrete yet.

 

[granddad]

I'm thinking RC servos will not move fast enough for the patterns you are describing , my 2 penneth (1P) would be mirror( or two or three ) on loud speaker cone .... (2P) a DIY laser level as a start.

 

[gophert]

Still at the thinking stage! Now I know how its done I will work on how to transfer off the scope onto a movable laser bed, piezo for some bits but maybe electro magnet bolts with springs in for wider movement, should be able to take the frequency ok. I will start with the scope to make sure I have the concept right then start making the laser stuff .

I actually like this project better than the hexapod lol, I will probably use the R PI for the sound/signal generation. Nothing is concrete yet.

Movable laser bed? Now were getting back to the full raster option. Do you have a laser printer in your scrap heap? You use the two mirror concept but a slightly different mirror. A kaiser printer uses the mirror on the perimeter of a hexagon piece of glass. That spinning hexagon becomes the x-(horizontal) rastering and a second mirror rotating on a second axis for the horizontal movement (much slower).

I also like the experiment on the speaker cone idea.

 

[Les Jones]

Hi LG,
I was very impressed with your last project. I think it is more university standard than school standard. A variation on the speaker idea to move mirrors to deflect a laser beam would be to us the head drive assembly from a disk drive. This already gives the angular movement required to move the mirror. You would need to use some springs to hold it in the static position. The amount of movement would then be proportional to the current through the coil. It would be basically the same as a loudspeaker but the movement angular. The high frequency response would not be as good as a loudspeaker.

Les.

 

[large_ghostman]

High guys, thanks for the idea's. The servos are more for the top video type patterns and if I use more than one laser I can move the patterns (I have some other stuff I want to try out as well ), so the servos wont have to move fast.

The speaker coil I was thinking about the floating ball I did with an electro magnetic field and solenoid, I could add a H bridge and have a solenoid push pull alot like the levitation things
I had a look in the music department and they have FL studio and some other software that might be good for the sound file. I have two small red lasers one is around 5W and the other is from a spirit level so maybe around 1W. I am looking on ebay to see if there are some non pointer type laser with focus lenses I can afford and are in the UK.

I am not 100% sure what exactly I am going to do other than add some filters and maybe do several types of patterns. having a very quick play with Matlab today it might be possible to produce a pretty large range of patters with the rotating mirrors alone, but I would really like to have both options. So again the servos or even some stepper motors I have from old CD case drives would do for moving the pointing in and out of the way of the mirrors.

The transducers I have were for a drum kit project, in the end I used larger ones so have 5 of the 20mm diameter ones left, these might even be able to move the laser enough. I want the filters put in so the user can interact as well. It will take a day or so for the idea to form properly , for the music sync side I can use the OScope and Matlab for trying things out. Worse case scenario then I can use just that for the exam. But as I was going to do a sound and light project anyway I will try and get the whole thing done.

My projects are normally more complex than they should be, but I have been tinkering on here for 5 years now, so like my last project I can go over the top at times . I went in hoping to get the video and permission to release pics, my teacher wasnt about so I still dont know what I can release yet. The university have said they will except me in September just after i turn 16, but I might stay on at school for a bit it's something I need to talk to my mum about. I dont like the idea of leaving her and my sister alone while I am away at Uni.

Thanks for the ideas I will post pics and updates as soon as I try a few things, I cant remember if I need a fixed voltage driver or a fixed current driver for the lasers now?? I will need to go and look it up, I was going to play with a few years back so I expect I got the information in one my lab books. I am lucky in having a very well equipped lab and a pretty good lot of components. I need to see if there are cheap bare lasers in the uk on ebay first. I found a headphone lead that is make both ends, so I might try some open source software I downloaded and see what I get on the scope