Pcom Finale project TumbleWeed. Created with Win Lei Ng.
Untitled from Talya Stein Rochlin on Vimeo.
We set off to build a self propelling ball which reacts to the users movement and leaves a drawn projection.
Our starting point was an attempt to hack a remote control car.
We soon discovered that remote controlled cars are very quick, and have very low torque. We needed high tork for the car to be strong enough in order to move a ball. We set off to find motors with hight torque, and started to build our own car.
The car response to key press Right Left Up and Down.
IMG 1928 from Talya Stein Rochlin on Vimeo.
Next we put the car into a big hamster ball and quickly discovered it is way to heavy for the ball.
We built a platform full all the ingredients of the new car:
Three days before finals I broke one of the pins of the motor. AHHA!
Both motors have to be the same.
We luckily managed to find 2 motors lent to us by our kind class mates. Though the motors have less torque then the motors we were working with, so we had to put a side the ball for now, and focus on the response of the car.
In the following video you can see the new car respond to key press.
We built a car from cardboard (to figure out the measurements) with the new motors, and place for the Arduino, breadboard and batteries.
Next we built the car from Plexiglas, by laser cutting it.
http://itp.nyu.edu/~tsr267/MyPOV/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/CosmicTumbleWeed_Finale1.pdf
Our final car & projection combined:
Future plans:
1. Track the human, and the car.
2. Light the car with two different colors, for front and back.
3. Change blue tooth with another solution for wireless, that doesn’t eat so much battery.
4. Find a stronger power sorse.
5. Find even stronger motors to be able to move a ball.
6. Create a self propelling ball!!