community news
|
Python Tool Turns Your Image Into a PCB Layout in KiCad With LEDs Placed to Help Make Your Own Display Maker's Fun Duck has published a video that pairs a hands-on teardown of a commercial custom LED display with the release of an open-source Python tool, the Custom LED Display Generator, that automates the design of similar displays from scratch.
The video opens with a physical dissection of a commercial unit, the kind used for glowing logo signs.… |
|
ESP32-S3-Based Pocket-Sized Retro Gaming Console With Brass Wires for the Frame and Wiring This is a pocket-sized retro gaming console built by HVT Lab. It's powered by an ESP32-S3 N16R8 microcontroller and plays classic games from legendary systems like Nintendo, Game Boy, and Sega. It uses a 2.4-inch IPS display, and he made the entire body of the console from 2 mm brass wire, demonstrating a unique blend of DIY electronics and metal craftsmanship. He… |
|
Maker Builds a 5-in-1 Cyber Deck Using an ESP32, 3.5-Inch Touchscreen Display, and Custom 3D-Printed Body Maker from the youtube channel Hacktuber recently made a custom "5-in-1 Cyber Deck" using ESP32. He demonstrated the project using two different ESP32 based development boards. One is a 2.8-inch CYD (Cheap Yellow Display) featuring an integrated touchscreen for quick prototyping, and the other is a 3.5-inch non-touch TFT display connected to an ESP32 C3 Mini, mounted onto a 3D-printed… |
|
Maker Turns a Normal IR TV Remote into a Functional Keyboard Using I2C for His Handheld PC In his DIY electronics project, maker Mirza Makes transformed an ordinary TV remote into a fully functional keyboard for his portable computer. The idea was to give it a soft keyboard, the kind of ones seen in TV remotes. The build centers around a high-performance Raspberry Pi 5 paired with a compact Elecrow 5-inch TFT touchscreen display to provide a… |
|
This DIY Twilight Photometer Uses an LED and ADA4530 to Measure the Ozone Layer’s Peak Height from the Ground Forrest M. Mims III has built a DIY twilight photometer that estimates the height of the ozone layer by measuring changes in the brightness of the sky before sunrise or after sunset. The project was inspired by the need for a simpler ground-based method of studying the atmosphere. Mims has worked with professional ozone-measuring instruments and wanted to create a smaller and less complicated… |
|
Maker Builds a Linked Portal Illusion Using Arduino Uno R4, Flywheel Launcher, and ToF Distance Sensors A maker from the youtube channel James' Programming has recently built a linked portal illusion using Arduino, 3D‑printed parts, and a custom aluminum frame. The setup uses two identical “portal” frames facing each other: when an object is thrown into one, it appears to instantly emerge from the other, creating a convincing real‑time portal illusion without any video tricks. … |
|
VolAnti: An Open-Source ESP32-S3 Device That Detects Fibre-Optic Drones With No RF Control Link, Using Sound A maker named Agam Rossen has created VolAnti, an open-source acoustic drone detector that identifies nearby multirotor drones by listening to the sound of their propellers. Unlike traditional drone detectors that look for radio-frequency signals, VolAnti focuses on the sound produced by spinning blades. This approach is particularly relevant to fibre-optic-controlled FPV drones, which send… |
|
Maker Builds a Wireless 3D Scanner Using ESP32-S3 and Rotating LiDAR That Streams Data to a Custom Android App A maker has built a standalone 3D LiDAR scanner that turns an inexpensive rotating LiDAR module into a wireless spatial-mapping device. The scanner rotates the sensor to collect distance measurements across multiple angles, allowing it to capture the shape of objects and surrounding spaces instead of producing only a flat 2D scan.
An ESP32-S3 acts as… |
|
Indian Team Trains Unitree G1 Humanoid for Classical Dance Using Motion Capture and Reinforcement Learning A humanoid robot named “Maya” has attracted attention in India after appearing on India's Got Latent, where it danced, rapped and interacted with people on stage. Maya is built on a Unitree G1 humanoid robot, but the Indian team behind the project added its own AI software, voice system, personality and custom movements. The team, associated with Tuesday Labs and students from Masters' Union,… |
|
Open-Source 7-DOF Tentacle Arm Uses ROS 2 MoveIt for Inverse Kinematics and Features a Holonomic Base James Bruton has built an open-source 7-DOF tentacle robotic arm that treats each joint as a 90° rotating stage, creating a highly flexible manipulator that can wrap around obstacles and reach into tight spaces. The design uses multiple Dynamixel servos chained into a serial kinematic chain, with custom 3D-printed links and structural parts to form a lightweight, compliant “tentacle” rather… |
|
Maker Builds a 12-DOF ROS 2 Quadruped Using Jetson Orin Nano for Vision and STM32 for Real-Time Control Ashish Agrahari, a Mechatronics Engineering student at the University of Waterloo, has recently built Orion, a 12-DOF quadruped robot dog designed and programmed from scratch over eight months, combining ROS 2 autonomy with custom embedded electronics. The system is split into two layers: a Jetson Orin Nano for high-level perception and planning, and custom STM32-based PCBs for deterministic,… |
|
He Trained a 2.9M-Parameter AI Image Generation Model, Ran It on a $1 RP2350 Chip and Open-Sourced the Project Generative AI image models usually require powerful processors and large amounts of memory, but a new project demonstrates that image generation can be pushed onto a small microcontroller. Tim, from Tim’s Blog, has implemented a generative AI image model on the RP2350, the microcontroller used in the Raspberry Pi Pico 2. Running on a Waveshare RP2350-Plus board, the system can generate 128×128… |
