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Moving eyes
11 years ago
Look at a creature's eyes- absolutely amazing. If I can even imitate a tiny piece of that...
So, having seen follow-me eyes, many beautifully done with lights, let's see what a techy can do.
Well, the eyelids should blink- seems easy right? Nope. The eyes should move- but how to control them? Hmmm. The iris could open- esential in a dragon after Smaug. And lights... even McCaffery described deep red light and swirling colour.
OK then. Moving the eyes is done with two servos turning plastic globes, controlled with a gyroscope on top of Errol's head. Now they follow the direction you're looking. But know that the software has timers and filters to keep the darn things from spazing out.
Eyelids that blink have cost me weeks of fooling around and I'm still not happy. I use 4 tiny servos, but they are noisy and not strong enough. Still, it's kind of cool that Errol does it all by himself, a little bit random and I can make him wink with a jaw switch
The iris is two fabric ribbons attached at the top of the globe, stretched a bit along the sides and pulled down by a cable from a servo. That is controlled by a jaw switch, but autofocus would be soooooo cool.
Now the lights. Well, that's tough because you look through there and light is the last thing you want in a dark room. I finally came up with a spherical lens and multicloured LED at the bottom of the globe. So I wanted the colour to change depending on Errol's mood. The hotter he gets, the eyes change blue to green. When he lets off smoke, they go red. And an ambient light sensor so that the light is never too bright. The software does all this autonomously.
Crazy complicated! So much fun to do. And ending where I began, any dog's eye shames my heroic efforts.
So, having seen follow-me eyes, many beautifully done with lights, let's see what a techy can do.
Well, the eyelids should blink- seems easy right? Nope. The eyes should move- but how to control them? Hmmm. The iris could open- esential in a dragon after Smaug. And lights... even McCaffery described deep red light and swirling colour.
OK then. Moving the eyes is done with two servos turning plastic globes, controlled with a gyroscope on top of Errol's head. Now they follow the direction you're looking. But know that the software has timers and filters to keep the darn things from spazing out.
Eyelids that blink have cost me weeks of fooling around and I'm still not happy. I use 4 tiny servos, but they are noisy and not strong enough. Still, it's kind of cool that Errol does it all by himself, a little bit random and I can make him wink with a jaw switch
The iris is two fabric ribbons attached at the top of the globe, stretched a bit along the sides and pulled down by a cable from a servo. That is controlled by a jaw switch, but autofocus would be soooooo cool.
Now the lights. Well, that's tough because you look through there and light is the last thing you want in a dark room. I finally came up with a spherical lens and multicloured LED at the bottom of the globe. So I wanted the colour to change depending on Errol's mood. The hotter he gets, the eyes change blue to green. When he lets off smoke, they go red. And an ambient light sensor so that the light is never too bright. The software does all this autonomously.
Crazy complicated! So much fun to do. And ending where I began, any dog's eye shames my heroic efforts.
