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Touche for Arduino: Advanced touch sensing.

by madshobye on May 28, 2012

Table of Contents

Touche for Arduino: Advanced touch sensing. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1

Intro: Touche for Arduino: Advanced touch sensing. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2

Step 1: Components neded . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2

Step 2: Build the hardware . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3

Step 3: Upload code to the Arduino board . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4

Step 4: Run the Processing sketch . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5

Related Instructables . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6

http://www.instructables.com/id/Touche-for-Arduino-Advanced-touch-sensing/
Intro: Touche for Arduino: Advanced touch sensing.
Credits: Arduino sensing done by DZL , Processing sketch and Instructable done by Mads Hobye .

Disney Research lab designed a novel way to detect touch. You can see a video of their demo here:

I had the honor to meet them at CHI2012 in Texas and I discussed with them whether it would be possible to convert their system into the Arduino platform. Their
immediate reaction was that the Arduino would not be able to generate good enough frequencies. I asked my friend DZL if he could solve this problem and this was his
solution to the problem:

The Touché hardware uses a really fancy Direct Digital Synthesizer IC from Analog Devices. It generates a really pure sine wave signal with frequencies between 1kHz
and 3.5MHz with high resolution. While the Arduino is capable of generating frequencies in this range the signal is a square wave with lots of harmonic frequency
components and really low frequency resolution.
Simply using this signal with the circuit described in the Touché paper result in a really messy frequency graph due to the harmonics from the square wave. The solution
is to use the filtering properties of the LC circuit to our advantage. By measuring the signal after the inductor (coil) rather than before we only see a nice sine wave
shaped signal free of all the unwanted frequency components. As a result we now see a peak in signal at resonance rather than a notch but the signal contains the same
information.

This has resulted in the following sensing capabilities:

At the conference they told me that they used 200 steps and they were able to get up to 2000. We have 150 in the above video.

Step 1: Components neded

To make the shield for Arduino you will need the following components:

Arduino
Usb cable
Shield
Pin stripes
Resister: 10k, 1MOmh, 3,3k
Capacitor: 100pf
Diode: 1N4148 diode
Coil / inductor: 10mH (cypax.dk part no: 07.055.0510)
Water bottle as sensing object.

If you do not have the inductor, it is basically a coil. You should be able to roll your own. Grab an empty roll of toilet paper wind very thin wire around a couple of hundred
times. You have to experiment until you get a peak on the graph.

Or be scientific:
http://www.pronine.ca/coilcal.htm
You want 10000µH

http://www.instructables.com/id/Touche-for-Arduino-Advanced-touch-sensing/
 Image Notes
1. The secret in this system is the coil

Image Notes
1. You can roll your own coil instead to using the off the shelves component.

Step 2: Build the hardware

The shield should be build according to the diagram included here. I have included a picture of the finished shield so you can look at the actual prototype.

Image Notes
1. Arduino pin 9

http://www.instructables.com/id/Touche-for-Arduino-Advanced-touch-sensing/
 Image Notes
1. Use a glass of water or a bottle for detection.

Step 3: Upload code to the Arduino board

There are lots of tutorials who have already explained how to program an Arduino and they do a much better job than we could. So we will just give you a couple of links:

http://arduino.cc/en/Guide/HomePage
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4HqXAmV_Ock
http://www.ladyada.net/learn/arduino/lesson1.html

The 3 things that usually cause trouble:

On windows you have to install the proper drivers (sometimes also on mac).
Remember to select the right serial port in the gui.
Remember to select the right board in the gui.

Below are the simplified steps to uploading the code to your Arduino board:

Download Arduino: www.arduino.cc

Connect the Arduino board to the computer via usb.
Download the code from github here: https://github.com/Illutron/AdvancedTouchSensing
Upload the code to the Arduino board.

http://www.instructables.com/id/Touche-for-Arduino-Advanced-touch-sensing/
Step 4: Run the Processing sketch
You will need processing to visualize the graph. Here are the general steps to get it up and running:

Download and install Processing (http://www.processing.org)

Get the sketch from github (https://github.com/Illutron/AdvancedTouchSensing - same link as the Arduino sketch)
Open the sketch in processing and run it. You will need to choose the right serial port in setup method. On mac it is usually 0 on windows it is usually the biggest
number.

The graphing sketch is a modified version of Bool Scotts graphing example:

http://boolscott.wordpress.com/2010/10/23/sneak-preview-of-my-open-source-project/

Congratulations - you are ready to go!

http://www.instructables.com/id/Touche-for-Arduino-Advanced-touch-sensing/
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http://www.instructables.com/id/Touche-for-Arduino-Advanced-touch-sensing/