Face tracking with an Android device
posted Oct 15th 2012 3:01pm by Mike Szczys
filed under: android hacks, software hacks
This Android device can recognize faces and move to keep them in frame. It’s a proof of concept that uses commonly available parts and software packages.
The original motivation for the project was [Dan O's] inclination to give the OpenCV software a try. OpenCV is an Open Source Computer Vision package that takes on the brunt of the job when it comes to discerning meaning from images. To give the phone the power to move he designed and printed his own mounting brackets for the phone and a couple of hobby servos. An IOIO board connects to the Android device in order to control the motors. On the software side all [Dan] needed to do was write some code to interface the output of the OpenCV face tracking modules with the input of the IOIO. See the finished project demonstration after the jump.
This system can easily be implemented with other hardware, like this Arduino-based version we looked at earlier in the year.
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Mirage 2.0 Lights up the desert with 4,024 LEDs
posted Oct 15th 2012 2:01pm by Jesse Congdon
filed under: led hacks
Registering a mutant vehicle at the Burning Man Department of Mutant Vehicles (DMV) is rough. To be allowed to operate at night, wacky rolling creations have to have a certain degree of lighting presence. This keeps vehicles  from blending into the scenery. Unfortunately Mirage 1.0 was built specifically with this in mind,  using reflective surfaces to turn a van into a semi-invisible shiny slab. Not even EL wire, an illuminated dance floor, and spot lights could placate the DMV. The solution? Wrap the entire friggen vehicle in a netting of 4,000 LEDs! Take that officials!
Most of the hardware is Phillips display stuff, digital LED fixture controllers are used to interpret HDMI data and then pipe out color data to addressed chains. All this mapping and addressing means that the entire setup functions like a 168×24 pixel monitor.  Split chains of LEDs also happen to allow the crew to operate the doors and get in and out of the vehicle.
The underlying car was built on the same sort of principal that hid the wheels of  Skywalker’s landspeeder, only in this case the idea was to cover an entire car with mylar and mirror. An interesting side effect of this mirror wrapping is that a sheen of desert dust helps reflect the ambient LED light quite well, blurring pixel colors together. It sort of makes us wonder about picking up a bucket of Mylar for some of our spaced out displays.
The Mirage crew has plans for next year, and have videos of several ideas on the site (portions of the test videos are NSFW).  Check out the video of Mirage 2.0 in action after the jump! Thanks [erland]!
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Arduino parking lot attendant
posted Oct 15th 2012 1:01pm by Mike Szczys
filed under: arduino ha