fibonacci sequence

2 Articles

Unique Clock Keeps Time The Fibonacci Way

July 10, 2019 by 9 Comments

You say your binary clock no longer has the obfuscation level needed to earn the proper nerd street cred? Feel like you need something a little more mathematically challenging to make sure only the cool kids can tell the time? Then this Fibonacci clock might be just the thing to build.

Granted, [TecnoProfesor]’s clock is a somewhat simplified version of an earlier version that was nigh impossible to decode. But with its color coding and [Piet Mondrian]-esque grids, it’s still satisfyingly difficult to get the time from a quick glance. The area of the blocks represents the Fibonacci sequence 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, and adding up which blocks are illuminated by the RGB LEDs behind the frosted front panel. That lets you tally up to 12 intervals; for the minutes and seconds, there are indicators for the powers multiples of 12 up to 48. Put it all together and you’ve got a unique and attractive graphical time display that’s sure to start interesting conversations when the mathematically disinclined try to use it. Check out the video below as the clock goes from 12:28:01 to 12:28:46. We think.

If this doesn’t scratch your itch for obfuscated clocks, we’ve got plenty of them. From random four-letter words to an analog digital clock to an epic epoch clock, we’ve got them all.

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Fibonacci Clock Is Hard To Read, Looks Good

May 7, 2015 by 18 Comments

Artists have been incorporating the golden ratio in their work for many hundreds of years, and it is thought that when proportions are in line with this ratio, it tends to be more aesthetically pleasing. With that in mind, the clock that [Philippe] created must mathematically be the best looking clock we’ve ever featured, even if it is somewhat difficult to tell time from it.

The clock is made up of squares which represent the first five numbers of the Fibonacci sequence. The squares are backlit with LEDs, which will illuminate red for the hour, green for the minute, and blue representing the overlap of hours and minutes. Simply add up the red and blue squares to get the hour, and add the green and blue squares to get the minutes. The minutes are displayed in 5 minute increments since there aren’t enough blocks though, so you’ll also have to multiply. Confused yet? If not, it turns out that there are several ways to display certain times using this method, any of which can be randomly selected by the clock. [Philippe] reports that there are 16 different ways to represent 6:30, for example.

The clock is driven by an ATmega328P and is housed in a wooden case. There are schematics and code available on [Philippe]’s site if you want to build your own, there are detailed descriptions of how to tell time with this clock. You’ll probably need those. If you like getting confused by clocks, you might also like this one as well.

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