Amakinoko
Mushroom-shaped chromatic light that reflects the weather
A teamed course project in the autumn term. Project presentation and videos🪐 (a few words in Chinese).
Randomly teamed-up work turned out unexpectedly intriguing! In the group were four other classmates from different majors, two of whom from the university next door.
The jellybean WS2812 LED strips can actually get quite bright. Take a segment of 24 LEDs, twist and knot them into a little ball, then glue it at the bottom to fix it inside of a 3D-printed spherical shell — a beautiful, dazzling light show.
Add an outer layer with coloured gauze beneath the hollows, and the light becomes softer and more diffused.
(To search for references, I even ran to IKEA and brought back the VINDKAST table lamp🪐 — though honestly its help was limited… Okay, fine, I admit that I just cannot resist these cute little gadgets.)
Draw all these onto a circuit board, add sensors for temperature, humidity, barometric pressure, and light intensity, and they will sense the changes of weather. Add a USB chip so that it can connect to a computer and get program replacements at any time.
Wait, doesn’t programming require installing that super-heavyweight toolchain? No worries! Just emulate a minimalist little computer🪐 to write whatever code anytime, anywhere.
Not much else to elaborate on, right? For all the details, please check the respository.
