My final project evolved from a latte art making robot to a condiment art making robot. The video (still uploading) describes most of the process and the final result, but I still would like to focus on a few pictures I took.
Here is an example of an interesting pattern made by the machine.
Profile view of the machine with standard issue ketchup
A side view of the finished project making a delicious work of art.
The electronics to go with the entire system. The LEDs blink too! The small red PCB is the breakout board for the microphone. It handles some of the more complicated amplification tasks with the audio.
I would also like show everyone https://processing.org/ It is a sister project to Arduino that uses Java to create visual interfaces on a PC.
My project will combine two servos on opposite ends of a latte. The project will allow for a finger painting like experience with the latte art.
The metaphor for the project is in the stir stick, as it stands for a human finger.
Research will involve a lot of coffee. I have been looking at how to make the foamy milk that is used in a latte and economical/time efficient methods of making a lot of coffee. I also need to research pouring techniques. (I am also entertaining the idea of using a webcam + laser combo instead of the sensors)
The first servo will spin the cup while the top one controls the yaw of a stir stick. The thermistor will control the rate of spin while the soft potentiometer will control the upper servo.
For my controller demonstration, I pulled out and reviewed an old project of mine: (starts at 1:18 – arduino and processing working together with a light sensor)
Although the technology has changed significantly, I was able to get everything running again between the arduino and processing.
For this project I chose to remix the Nyan Cat Meme, because it has all of the hallmarks of a great meme: annoying soundtrack, a cat and food!
Originally I was going to track the cat in 3D, by tracking four color blobs.
This proved to be very difficult and unreliable (and thus I was not able to present in class), so I resorted to adding a mobile device as a light source back to the webcam.
The patch itself is pretty complicated. Ill brake it down here:
This section of the patch controls when the sound and animation should start and stop. It is connected to the motion detection part
The inspiration for ./MALL 3015 came after a trip to the mall (I originally went to see Interstellar – a great film and potential classic). While looking at clothes, I though how wonderful it would be to just download a new look on your computer and have it be reflected on your body, without having to leave the house. The technology isn’t ready for a full implementation, so I explored how a UI would look for such a tool.
A critical element to the program is the folder structure for the images. The images are loaded with absolute paths
The main Max file is quite a mess. The images and loading video are loaded onto corner pin objects to be mapped onto the projector. The MaKey MaKey interface is connected to sub patchers that choose the image and to a sound object.
The sub patcher generates a random number from 0 to 3, scales it to 1 to 4. The number is then selected and the associated image is loaded.
The entire composition is projected onto a retro themed computer interface.
I am just beginning the long journey to bring my artistic ability fully into the interactive realm. I have learned that the creation of the composite as a whole is significantly more difficult than making the individual parts that make up the piece. For the Geometric Abstraction, this difficulty presented itself through getting the correct frame blending between the layers so that the objects felt “alive” rather than just purely responding to the music. Adding a slow pulse in both object size and the background color further added to the desired affect. Composition is extremely important in the video overlays in the interactive picture project. The Puppet Warp and Content Aware Fill tools in Adobe Photoshop CC really helped with creating a realistic interaction between the picture, the animation and the resulting sound.
