Good Morning from my Robotics Lab! This is Shadow_8472, and today, I am continuing on the path to building an anti feline century. Let’s get started.
Last week, I talked about boat port stuff, this week because I had Tango over to review that project. This last week, I actually made a contact with what I hope will be a regular, new resource for help on projects. My long term goals include getting a comments section where people can crowd solve the problem, but as of this writing, I don’t think I’ve had a comment in the first whole year. Maybe I don’t have that set up, but for now, I’m mapping the project up.
So far, I’ve gotten most of the electronics I’ll need, barring the highly specialized speaker/transducer and supporting circuitry; I’ve printed the bottom half of the case and figured on about the orientation everything will be; and I’ve started on the tutorials. Apparently, I forgot Shift-Middle-click moves the camera’s focus point around the scene.
The next step is still to finish learning Blender well enough to model the upper half of the case. Putting the hardware all together will follow after I have something to make the sound. After that, I have software development. I’ll need to research how to use OpenCV and figure out how to make it identify a cat. Once that’s reliable, I can hook up the sound and set it up for operation. Once the prototype is proving effective, I can figure out just how little power in a machine I need and I can build a final version to free up my prototype. The Pi and its camera will stay with the prototype. Any sound setup will be moved to the more permanent unit.
Potential problems include the need to reprint the case with ABS plastic for its higher temperature tolerance. After the prototype has proven itself, the cat in question will likely be scared of the case if he doesn’t challenge it.
Final Question: What possible problems am I missing that I should anticipate?
MineCraft Boat Race Port Part 7
Good Morning from my Robotics Lab! This is Shadow_8472, and today, I am presenting my work to update the Boat Race from Titaincraft Season one’s custom dimension, The Above. Let’s get Started.
If you are here from the server and spot the “Part 7” in the title, don’t worry. I’m writing this post as a fresh introduction to the project. If you’re interested in the development of the project, feel free to go back and have a read, and if I post about further development, Part 9 and above will also be available.
The Above’s boat race was originally built by Duke and 2Cubed with testing by dminer78. In the original game, players would wander into an ice cave and get teleported to the lobby where they could pick an arena to play their personal next level in. Each of the five levels has a different maze to navigate, ending with a row of gold blocks serving as the finish line. After completing the last course, the game would award the player with a Tango head, the special currency of The Above’s prize system.
The new edition used Duke’s levels but has many technological improvements over 2Cubed’s programming. The 1.13 execute command’s overhaul means that whole blocks of commands that were running all the time are replaced with one or two commands with a smaller footprint on the server’s CPU, and they only run as often as needed. A planned time trial mode would increase the replay value (besides the Tango heads). As part of this planned feature, there would also be a way to choose what level pack you want, and whether or not to shuffle the levels among other, new level tracks. And thanks to MineCraft’s introduction of functions, I decided to rebuild the game so it could be easily expandable; not only should it be fairly easy to add even more new levels but also new games as well as time goes on. For now, I’m calling it the Modular Game Center.
Working on this project, I learned a lot and overcame many challenges, many with the help of Jamcdonald120 and a few others. If you want to learn about a few of them, go back and read parts 1-6. As of this writing, the Modular Game Center still needs a little work once 1.13 gets a stable release and Spigot gets its update in turn.
Final Question: What game would you like to see added to the Modular Game Center?
A New Tool Part 2
Good Morning from my Robotics Lab! This is Shadow_8472, and today, I am continuing coverage of my new prototyping tool. Let’s get started.
I didn’t get as far as I thought I would this week. The mission this week was to get the top all printed, but that didn’t happen. The problem was that I didn’t already have all the skills to accomplish the task already, mainly proficiency in Blender. That’s my goal for next week, learn Blender well enough to finish modifying the upper half of the case.
As for what did get done, I managed to start developing the camera mount. The case I’m printing for my Raspberry Pi is based off a PacMan Ghost, printed in red. The first print, I used Blender to isolate the target eye from the rest of the 3D model, and printed it on fast. It took about 20 minutes, as opposed to a full day plus if I were doing the regular top on a respectable quality level. I drilled a hole in the printed piece and held it over the camera, using larger and larger drill bits until I didn’t see a red plastic border anymore.
For my second draft, I added a cylinder mesh in Blender and scaled one end down, forming a truncated cone. I used a Boolean filter on difference mode to cut out a hole for the lens. It didn’t fit well enough, so I printed another one with a more embellished cone.
My father taught me how to properly use a Vernier caliper. I already knew about the outside and inside edge measurement spots, but the the depth on the end of the ruler was new to me. Also new to me was the use of the Vernier scale; I never before got the idea that the extra marks on the slider were offset just a little bit. I think I had heard about the extra digit of precision, but only now did I get that only one was supposed to line up at once.
I used the caliper to measure up the camera. The plan from there is to model up a crude representation of it in Blender and use that to design the hole before I try printing up another pass. Giving some new thought to it, I want to angle the camera such that the ghost is looking at you, instead of “using peripheral vision.”
The next step may be boring, but it’s something I need to do. This week, I need to actually watch a few video tutorials on Blender. I already want to go through the videos by Blender Guru, Link to his channel. I’ve already tried going through his videos on the basics of Blender before, but I kept getting distracted. And no wonder! I just added the length of the videos I think I’ll need, the core Blender basics and the modeling basics, and it came out to almost six and a half hours! And most of that is in 45 minute chunks. The basic tutorial includes lighting and rendering tutorials, so in theory I could skip them for now, but I really should know how to use them.
Final Question: I’m at least somewhat likely to get more than one Pi computer in the foreseeable future. What kind of case should I search for to print up for the next one?
A new tool
Good Morning from my Robotics Lab! This is Shadow_8472, and today, I have shelved the boat race port pending review and started on a new project. Let’s get started.
My next goal is a project to keep the cat off the counter. After some early research, I came across OpenCV, an open source computer vision library. Some people have even already gotten it to identify cat faces. Keeping my long-term goal of a social robot in mind, this sounds like the direction to go, rather than a motion detector attached to a deterrent.
Now, to chose the hardware. I don’t know what the system requirements my program will need, so I decided to overshoot and make a “lab assistant” computer to help me with future small projects. A day or so of research later, taking into account Linux as a platform, system specs, community size, and likeliness of support form said community. Of note, I did try to include Fair Trade or equivalent as a criteria, but with electronics, it’s almost impossible to find a supplier who’s sure their product doesn’t include slave labor in their supply chain. In the end I narrowed it down to the Raspberry Pi 3 model B+. Also of note, the Pi is made in the UK (or China in peak times), so my guess is that at least some of the workers were more likely paid a fair living.
The assortment of starter packages is abundant. You can get the Pi alone for about $35, but starter packages tend to include other necessary things like a power cord and case. This led me to look into them and along the way, I learned that the Pi needs a micro SD card to run.
Before I even picked out the Pi for sure, I found a case to 3D print for it. In this case, it’s a Pac Man Ghost by Darren Furniss on MyMiniFactory.com. I started printing one up, but accidentally interrupted it about 10 out of 28 hours into printing the first part. No more heavy objects in front of a pressure based touch screen for me. While the second attempt was underway, the Pi itself arrived, and I set it up. A camera arrived with it, and I even managed to get a picture, though one test picture crashed the system. I haven’t gone to investigate yet.
The upper part of the case is the ghost’s head. Since I’m mounting a camera as part of the setup, I want to have the Pi look out one of its eyes (I’d need a second board to use a second camera). My first thought was to drill a hole but when I saw the narrow walls in the base with infill, I figured pulling the file into Blender and digitally drilling would be more effective. Before I do that, I need measurements so I drill the right hole and can actually mount the Pi camera correctly.
I started encountering small problems when I realized the Pi was mounted upside down in the ghost’s lower half, extending the distance the already short camera’s ribbon cable has to cover. After sundown Saturday, (I let my family have a day of peace from the printer’s constant whining during Sabbath hours) I started up a fast quality of the top. The file online said both parts were supposed to print without a support structure, but as I suspected, a short, long gap didn’t form correctly. I canceled the print, but learned a lot from the partial print.
Pulling the Pi from it’s kit case and putting it in the printed base, I discovered three things: The screw holes don’t quite line up (The case is meant for a Pi B and I have a Pi B+), and the gap in the top is necessary for port access for the power, if not the HDMI, and finally, by comparing the partial print to the 3d model, I discovered the eye does not line up at all with where the camera cable wraps around.
None of the challenges I’ve encountered so far are insurmountable. My only big concern is that the Pi will melt though the PLA case I have for it. Next week, I’m going to come up with a good 3d model for the ghost’s top where I can mount the camera.
Final Question: There is a real possibility I will need to switch to ABS for computer casings. What colors should I start with?