05.12.06
Here are some pictures
I’ll write comments on them later, for now, here they are:
Wiring the flashlights
Putting the frame together
Wiring the frame
Final Friday
05.07.06
This is how you should REALLY wire the flashlights
We’ve had some of the flashlights burn out on us twice already (probably three times by now). The problem is that the AC adapter we’re using sucks (from what I’ve heard, this is actually a common problem): it says it’s 9 volts, but my voltmeter says (and my voltmeter wouldn’t lie to me) that it’s really almost 13.5 volts - and that’s a big difference. A big enough difference to cause my light bulbs to burn out while in the prime of their lives…a tragedy.
Here’s what you should do if you want to do this the right way. You could add in more flashlights, say four groups instead of three. Then you’d eat up about 12 volts, which would prolong the life of the bulbs significantly. You could also add in a few resistors to eat up the leftover voltage. Just use a multimeter to tell you what the circuit’s current is and then use the formula V=IR, or R=V/I, to tell you what value resistor you need to consume the leftover voltage you’re seeing (in this case it’d be 4.5 volts).
Another problem we had is that since some lights are in parallel with each other, when one burnt out ALL current went to the remaining light. Well, this was way too much current for one bulb to take, so it would burn out too. Our lights were rated at 0.5A, so the most obvious solution is to put fuses in the circuit so that instead of burning up the other flashlight you just fry the fuse. In this setup, it would have been far easier to throw in a new fuse than install a new bulb. Although, if you solve the initial problem and prevent bulbs from burning out in the first place, this probably wouldn’t be an issue.
‘An Accident Waiting to Happen’ Summary
In this post I’m going to try and tie up all the loose ends relating to the project. In the end we went with the name ‘An Accident Waiting to Happen’ as it was much more descriptive of the vibe the piece gives. So much for Invisible Drums.
The piece has a few main parts, they are:
1. The frame. You can see its construction here.
2. The light sensors. Since we only wound up using 8 sensors this diagram is incorrect. The final version of the circuit looks like this.
3. The Pd patch. The basic design was more or less unchanged, but there were some additional tweaks to it. This is the final version of the file.
4. The sounds. All of the sounds are in the public domain, so I can post them without getting sued (YES!). Here they are. They have names like ‘a-high’ and ‘f-low’…keep in mind that the ‘a’ sensor was at the front, and the ‘h’ sensor was in the back.
5. The lights. We ended up using six identical flashlights, they were supposed to run off of two C cell batteries apiece. We had them running off of a 9V power adapter, this is what that circuit looks like:
6. The logochip. To find out everything you need about this wonderful fella, go here. The final code I ran on the chip didn’t differ too much from the original version I had. I added in some pauses and removed the code for the extra sensors we didn’t use. It is located here.
With that information you should be able to recreate this project, putting it together in a way that suits you. Start with the frame. Then attach the flashlights to it so that they shine in interesting places. Then place the photocells in a similar way. Attach the logo chip and computer and it’ll do whatever you want it to do.
05.04.06
Houston, we have a problem…
On Tuesday Cheston and I noticed that the flashlights weren’t turning on. This was an oversight on our part, but we figured out the problem… Read the rest of this entry »
04.29.06
It’s over!
Final Friday was yesterday. The piece worked. Cheston and I stayed up pretty much all night on Thursday making sure that it worked. At around 2AM the flashlights wouldn’t work at all (we had re-run the wires to make it look cleaner) so we were in a frenzy to get them going again. On Friday we covered part of the frame in painter’s cloth (the clearish plastic sheeting) to help obscure the internals of the project. We also put flexible automotive conduit over the top bar in the frame to hide the wires there too. All in all it looked pretty snazzy considering what it looked like on Wednesday. Pictures are forthcoming.
It worked as well as we could have hoped. Someone stepped on a photosensor, rendering it useless, but other than that everything seemed to go off without a hitch. It was cool watching people (especially little kids) walk through and play around with it once they got it all figured out. Around 8:45 I left to go get some sleep, I really needed it. Hopefully nothing went wrong after I left 
04.24.06
‘Compute Audio’ on Pd patch load
I just realized that anyone that will use Pure Data will have this issue, so I should post my solution to it. If you’re using Pd, it won’t do anything usefull unless you’ve got it set to compute audio. In order to set it to compute audio when it loads your patch you need to send a ‘loadbang’ to a message called “; pd dsp 1″
It should look something like this in the patch:
[loadbang]
|
“; pd dsp 1″
Hope that helps someone out.
Computer Issues
I was faced with a dilemma. If the computer running Pd for the show doesn’t have a mouse, keyboard, or monitor connected to it, how am I going to update the sounds that it plays or change the Pd patch it runs? The answer is below… Read the rest of this entry »
I’m sleepy…
On a side note; I saw ‘Silent Hill’ on Friday. Good movie. But you shouldn’t watch it if you’re planning on spending several hours in Shift Space the next two days. I was really jumpy…
I’ve spent probably a good ~20 hours this weekend working on the project. It’s really coming together but there’s still a lot of stuff left to do. I didn’t have a camera with me, but I’ll hopefully have some pictures up by Monday. Here’s what’s been done since Friday: Read the rest of this entry »
04.20.06
It’s alive
…well, sorta. Today during the workshop we got the frame built. It took a very interesting (and cool) twist; we really managed to make the frame look mangled. If you’re down in shift space anytime soon, I’m curious to know what you think about it. Cheston took some pictures, so once they’re uploaded I’ll show them off here as well.
After work today I’m going to run to Radioshack and pick up a few pieces that we need. I forgot that the Logochip needs to run off an AC adapter; so I need to pick up a 5V regulator as well as a C battery holder (we have yet to test the wiring on our flashlights - oops). I might also mount the lights (assuming they work) on the frame and test them out. I might wire up some sensors, but I doubt that I’ll feel that ambitious tonight.
All in all, I’m pretty impressed with how far this project has gone and I’m optimistic that we’ll have it done (and working!) by next Friday…if not a little sooner.
04.17.06
Project Thoughts
With the frame welded, the two things left to focus on are:
1) Putting all the pieces together. In the next week we need to reassemble the frame in shift space (shouldn’t be too hard, that’ll get done on Monday), attach the flashlights to the frame and supply them with power, and attach the sensors to the frame and make sure the logo chip talks to them properly. These things must all be done by the end of this coming weekend or we will have fallen woefully behind.
2) Selecting sounds and finishing up the display. As far as sounds go, the main thought is to use sounds to convey the idea that the building has (barely) survived a fire. We’ll need to identify about 20 sounds and deploy them in the piece so that they deliver this vibe. Another idea I had (although it is much more work), is to make three/four possible sound arraingments. For example, during one run-through, the piece would play noises corresponding to a fire. But during the next run, it will play noises corresponding to a tornado. The next time, it’ll be a bomb/terrorist attack. The fourth possiblity is it would play the calm, every-day noises of a house/office. In this way, you’ll never quite know what disaster you’re going to walk into. Going about this way will require a rehaul of the Pd patch, but I think it’s do-able. First I think we should make sure to get everything else taken care of and make sure we’ll at least have something functioning to display (ahaha) before we tweak it anymore.
Are those good/bad ideas?
