Halloween Project with Skull, Arduino, Blinking LEDs and Scrolling Eyes | Maker, MakerED, MakerSpaces

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Halloween Project with Skull, Arduino, Blinking LEDs and Scrolling Eyes

Soon is Halloween, so let us create a scary project while coding and DIY (tinkering a bit…). The tutorial is made for people who don’t have a 3D-Printer, we will use a 21 cm plastic Skull for 13€ bought on Amazon, 3 ARDUINO NANO’s and two 8 mm WHITE LEDs to realize this project. First let us have a look how the project will look to give you the right motivation to start it, check the video below, please:

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As you might have realized while watching the video, there are 3 different effects in it:

• The rolling eyes, we were talking about it already in following tutorial:

  • First Steps with the Arduino-UNO R3 | Maker, MakerED, Coding | 24×8 LED MATRIX | Rolling Animated Eyes

• The blinking WHITE LEDs in the nose, please check the following tutorial below:
  • https://www.instructables.com/id/Multiple-Blinking-LED-on-the-Arduino/
• The blinking LEDs around the teethes, we are using WS2812B Addressable RGB LED Strip (6 LEDs), check tutorial below, please:
  • https://randomnerdtutorials.com/guide-for-ws2812b-addressable-rgb-led-strip-with-arduino/

In the above mentioned tutorials, you will find the wiring as well as the codes (Sketches):

First start with one of the 3 projects, make the wiring and upload the code to the ARDUINO Nano and test it. IF it is working start the second one and so on… Once finished the above mentioned we will need to integrate the hardware into the Skull…

Check below, please, the different steps…

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21 cm plastic Skull front view Click image, please, to enlarge AMAZON.DE: https://amzn.to/2MWDzrP	21 cm plastic Skull side view Click image, please, to enlarge AMAZON.DE: https://amzn.to/2MWDzrP
Cut the Skull Click image, please, to enlarge	WS2812B soldering Click image, please, to enlarge AMAZON.DE: https://amzn.to/2NvdB3U
WS2812B soldering and heatshrinking tube Click image, please, to enlarge. AMAZON.DE: https://amzn.to/2NvdB3U	WS2812B soldering and heatshrinking tube fixed in the Skull Click image, please, to enlarge.

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Fixing EMO Display with hot glue Click image, please, to enlarge. AMAZON.COM: https://amzn.to/2zoLyup	Fixing EMO Display with hot glue Click image, please, to enlarge. AMAZON.COM: https://amzn.to/2zoLyup
5x ARDUINO NANO Click image, please, to enlarge. AMAZON.DE: https://amzn.to/2NyO5uH	Cabling of the ARDUINO Nano’s Click image, please, to enlarge.

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SO, we have seen now ALL the necessary steps to make this project working, up to YOU now to bring in the electronics into the Skull and seal the Skull later with hot glue. You can use the above showing cable solution or to try to put everything on a Strip-Board and solder it; YOUR choice! 😉

Idea: You could try to include as well a proximity sensor which enables the playing of the devil laughter in the video 😉

How? Check below please:

• https://www.scoop.it/t/21st-century-learning-and-teaching/?&tag=PIR+Sensors
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Some devil laughter sounds:

• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pVY1-v97Mic&list=PLmQQliRjsNivKF_fY_x299UQhIhmjzhFN&index=2
• …

 

Stay tuned for next blog post(s) 😉

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L’auteur Gust MEES est Formateur andragogique / pédagogique TIC, membre du “Comité Conseil” de “Luxembourg Safer Internet” (LuSI), appelé maintenant BEESECURE, partenaire officiel (consultant) du Ministère de l’éducation au Luxembourg du projet  ”MySecureIT“, partenaire officiel du Ministère du Commerce au Luxembourg du projet ”CASES” (Cyberworld Awareness and Security Enhancement Structure). L’auteur était aussi gagnant d’un concours en électronique en 1979 ( Pays germaniques ) et voyait son projet publié dans le magazine électronique “ELO”. The author Gust MEES is ICT Course Instructor, ”Member of the Advisory Board” from “Luxembourg Safer Internet” (LuSI), BEESECURE, Official Partner (Consultant) from the Ministry of Education in Luxembourg, project “MySecureIT“, Official Partner from the Ministry of Commerce in Luxembourg, project “CASES” (Cyberworld Awareness and Security Enhancement Structure). The author was also a winner of an electronics contest (Germanic countries) in 1979 and got his project published in the “Electronics Magazine ELO”.

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Keywords necessary for me to create this blog post: Arduino UNO R3, Arduino NANO, UNO R3 Project, Halloween, scary, EMO LED Matrix, devil laugh, WM2812B RGB LEDs, 8 mm WHITE LEDS, Plastic Skull, Heatshrinking-Tube, coding, learning to learn, learning by doing,

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First Steps with the Arduino-UNO R3 | Maker, MakerED, Coding | 24×8 LED MATRIX | Rolling Animated Eyes

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Rolling Animated Eyes

Since very long I was looking for the How-To of “Rolling Eyes” on a LED-Matrix for one of my projects with Arduino. I found it through my searches on Google on a tutorial using Raspberry PI from “SunFounder”; a tutorial which shows as well the use with an Arduino UNO. So I had a look on Amazon…

Where to buy:

• https://www.amazon.com/24×8-LED-Dot-Matrix-Module/dp/B0796PX3ZN/.

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How To use the EMO 24×8 LED DOT MATRIX MODULE with the Arduino

The steps are pretty easy:

Step 1. Download the library

Download the library SunFounder_Emo

Step 2. Install the library

Open the Arduino software, and select Sketch -> Include Library ->Add .ZIP Library.

Step 3. Open the example

Go to File -> Examples -> Sunfounder Emo -> emo_animate

Well, as I don’t want to reinvent the wheel, I recommend to you to follow the complete tutorial with screenshots and code explanation below, please:

Link:

• http://wiki.sunfounder.cc/index.php?title=24x8_LED_Dot_Matrix_Module_-_Emo

 

For the wiring, check below, please.

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Click the image, please, to enlarge

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Concerning the code: IF you want just to have the rolling eyes, you need to modify a bit the Sketch (code), BUT it ISN’T difficult at all, JUST to bring in some “//” in some parts of the code. It’s called <===> uncommenting <===> which means THAT that part of code isn’t executed by the microcontroller (Arduino)! THE code as it shows, apart from the rolling eyes, ALSO a PACMAN… Well, YOU decide to keep the code complete and/or ONLY the “Rolling Eyes”… Please check the PICs below.

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In the above PIC you see the part of the ORIGINAL code which is interesting for us.

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In the above PIC we see changes made in the red boxes. We just uncomment several lines by putting a ” // ” in front of the lines of code. The ” // ” is twice a ” / “.

BEST way would be to load and try the original code on the Arduino UNO to find out how it works and later to change the code as shown above.

Have fun by your Learning-By-Doing and stay tuned for next blog posts 😉

You can see the code in action in the video below.

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L’auteur Gust MEES est Formateur andragogique / pédagogique TIC, membre du “Comité Conseil” de “Luxembourg Safer Internet” (LuSI), appelé maintenant BEESECURE, partenaire officiel (consultant) du Ministère de l’éducation au Luxembourg du projet  ”MySecureIT“, partenaire officiel du Ministère du Commerce au Luxembourg du projet ”CASES” (Cyberworld Awareness and Security Enhancement Structure). L’auteur était aussi gagnant d’un concours en électronique en 1979 ( Pays germaniques ) et voyait son projet publié dans le magazine électronique “ELO”. The author Gust MEES is ICT Course Instructor, ”Member of the Advisory Board” from “Luxembourg Safer Internet” (LuSI), BEESECURE, Official Partner (Consultant) from the Ministry of Education in Luxembourg, project “MySecureIT“, Official Partner from the Ministry of Commerce in Luxembourg, project “CASES” (Cyberworld Awareness and Security Enhancement Structure). The author was also a winner of an electronics contest (Germanic countries) in 1979 and got his project published in the “Electronics Magazine ELO”.

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Stay tuned for next blog post(s) 😉..
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Keywords necessary for me to create this project: EMO LED Display, Rolling Eyes, Arduino, Maker, MakerED, MakerSpaces, Coding, Animations on LED Matrix, 

 

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