Visualize Twitter with an LED matrix

visualizing-twitter

What's your favorite color? Don't tell us, Tweet it to [Sebastian's] favorite color Twitter display and you'll be contributing to the artwork hanging on his wall. This answers a very important question, what do you do with your projects after they're completed? For us the best part is the planning and building. Once it's done the thrill is pretty much gone for us. We haven't even switched on … [Read more...]

Color NTSC video directly from an AVR chip

color-ntsc-from-avr-chip

We've seen composite video out from AVR chips many times before. But we can't remember coming across one that managed to produce a color signal. This project does just that, producing a color video signal from an ATmega168 without using external integrated circuits. [CNLohr] is seen here showing off his accomplishment. You'll remember him from the glass-slide PCB server project he's been … [Read more...]

Soft robots given veins the let them change their stripes

color-changing-soft-robots

If it were alive this robot would be classified as an invertebrate. It lacks a backbone and interestingly enough, all other bones are missing as well. The Harvard researchers that developed it call it a soft robot. It's made out of silicone and uses pathways built into the substance to move. By adding pressurized air to these pathways the appendages flex relative to each other. In fact, after … [Read more...]

Doom for your calculator gets a color upgrade

ndoomfinal

You're not still playing nDoom in black and white, are you? What decade do live in? Thankfully, the Doom port for TI-nspire calculators has been upgraded to support color. That is if you've got the hardware to run it. The video after the break (and the image above) shows a TI-nspire CX running the popular first-person-shooter. It's seen several upgrades since the beta version which we saw … [Read more...]

Make Your Own Custom Hot Glue Sticks

hotglue

Hot glue guns can be very handy tools for bonding all sorts of surfaces, while getting you accustomed to plastic burns. The one thing they lack though is color, and while yes, you can on occasion find colored glue sticks, there is usually only a limited selection and they cost way more than the normal amber or clear sticks. [Ken] solves the blandness problem of hot glue sticks in his kitchen, as … [Read more...]

It’s like… I can tell the time just by the color, man

color-changing-clock

[Alex] has reduced the resolution of his timepiece as a trade-off for speedy-readability. At least that's what he claims when describing his color-changing clock. It uses a ShiftBrite to slowly alter the hue of the clock based on the current time. The concept is interesting: 12:00 starts off at white and slowly fades to green at 3:00, blue at 6:00, red at 9:00, and back to white by 12:00 to start … [Read more...]

Lightsaber color selector

lightsaber-color-selector

[George Hadley] developed a nice setup to control the color of a replica Lightsaber. A small PCB houses a PIC 18F2221 and three switching transistors for the colors. A powerful LED resides in the tip of the handle, lighting up the diffuser that makes up the blade. But our favorite part is the control scheme. He's embedded a small RGB LED in the handle, giving feedback as to which color of light … [Read more...]