Bionic Arduino

Introduction to Microcontrollers with Arduino

Class 2

13 Nov 2007 - machineproject - Tod E. Kurt

 What’s for Today
• Random Behavior
• RGB LEDs
• Color mixing
• Analog input with variable resistors
• Potentiometers & photocells
• Basic serial input & output
• Playing sound with piezo buzzers
Recap: Blinky LED
Make sure things still work

compile

upload

Load “File/Sketchbook/Examples/Digital/Blink” TX/RX flash

k
bl in
k
n
bli sketch runs
Known Good Configuration

Rule #1 of experimenting:

Before trying anything new,

Get back to a known working state

So spend a few minutes & get “Blink” working again

Getting the Board Set Up

schematic

wire up pin 9 LED too

 Questions / Review

Any questions, comments, or problems?

Aside: LED Light Tubes

Snug-fit straws on
the end of your
LEDs to make
them glow more
visibly
 Random Behavior
“CandleLight”

Uses simple
pseudo random
number generator
to mimic flame

Use random(min,max) to
pick a number between min
& max.
 Analog Input
To computers, analog is chunky
 Analog Input
• Many states, not just two (HIGH/LOW)
• Number of states (or values, or “bins”) is resolution
• Common computer resolutions:
• 8-bit = 256 values
• 16-bit = 65,536 values
• 32-bit = 4,294,967,296 values
 Analog Input
• Arduino (ATmega168) has six ADC inputs
• (ADC = Analog to Digital Converter)
• Reads voltage between 0 to 5 volts
• Resolution is 10-bit (1024 values)
• In other words, 5/1024 = 4.8 mV smallest
voltage change you can measure
 Analog Input
Sure sure, but how to make a varying voltage?
With a potentiometer. Or just pot.

+5V–
50k
measure–
gnd–

The pot you have

pots also look like this

 Potentiometers
Moving the knob is like moving
where the arrow taps the voltage on the resistor
 What good are pots?
• Anytime you need a ranged input
• (we’re used to knobs)

• Measure rotational position

• steering wheel, robotic joint, etc.

• But more importantly for us, potentiometers

are a good example of a resistive sensor
 Arduino Analog Input
Plug pot directly into breadboard

Two “legs” plug into +5V & Gnd

(red + & blue -) buses

Middle “post” plugs into a row

(row 7 here)

Run a wire from that row to

Analog In 2
 Pot & LED Circuit
This is what your board should have on it now

In schematics, inputs are usually on the left, outputs on the right

Also, more positive voltages are on the top, more negative on the bottom
 Varying Brightness by
Hand
“PotDimmer”

Turn the knob to

change LED
brightness input
process the
input data
output

Most all embedded systems

have a
input→process→output
loop
 Two Ways to
Hook up LEDs

To turn ON: digitalWrite(9,HIGH) To turn ON: digitalWrite(9,LOW)

To turn OFF: digitalWrite(9,LOW) To turn OFF: digitalWrite(9,HIGH)

To set brightness: analogWrite(9,val) To set brightness: analogWrite(9,255-val)

 RGB LEDs
Normal LED
anode +
anode +
cathode –
cathode –

RGB LED
anode +
red cathode –
anode +
blue cathode –
green cathode –
red blue green

actually 3 LEDs in one package

 Color Mixing
With just 3 LEDs you can make any* color

With RGB you can

make any color
(except black)

Mixing light is the additive color model

(paint is subtractive color, and can give you brown)
 Laying out RGB LED
Circuit

slightly bend the longest lead and plug it into the +5v (red) bus
plug remaining leads into rows (12,14,&16 here)
connect 220 (red-red-brown) resistors across middle to matching rows
run wires from resistors to pins 9,10,11 of Arduino, can color-code if you want
 RGB Color Fading
“RGBMoodLight”

Slow color fading

and mixing

Also outputs the current color

values to the serial port
Pot-controlled RGB
 Pot-controlled RGB
“RGBPotMixer”

Use the pot from

before to control
the color mix

The code turns the single ranged

input value into “sectors” where
each sector is a color
 Sensing the Dark
• Pots are example of a voltage divider
• Voltage divider splits a voltage in two
• Same as two resistors, but you can vary them
 Sensing the Dark:
Photocells
• aka. photoresistor, light-dependent resistor
• A variable resistor
• Brighter light == lower resistance
• Photocells you have range approx. 0-10k-1M

schematic symbol
 Photocell Circuit

pin A2

brown-black-orange

gnd

Try it with RGBPotMixer from before

 Mood Light

Diffuser made from

piece of plastic
scratched with
sandpaper
 Resistive sensors
circuit is the same
for all these

thermistor
(temperature)
photocell
(light)

flex sensor
(bend, deflection)

force sensors also air pressure

(pressure) and others
 Communicating
with Others
• Arduino can use same USB cable for
programming and to talk with computers
• Talking to other devices uses the “Serial”
commands
• Serial.begin() – prepare to use serial
• Serial.print() – send data to computer

• Serial.read() – read data from computer

 Watch the TX/RX
LEDS
• TX – sending to PC
• RX – receiving from PC
• Used when programming
or communicating
 Arduino Says “Hi”
“SerialHelloWorld”

Sends “Hello world!”

to your computer

Click on “Serial
Monitor” button to see
output

Watch TX LED compared

to pin 13 LED
 Telling Arduino What To
“SerialReadBasic”
Do

You type “H”, LED

blinks

In “Serial Monitor”,
type “H”, press Send

Serial.available() tells you if

data present to read
Arduino Communications
is just serial communications

• Psst, Arduino doesn’t really do USB

• It really is “serial”, like old RS-232 serial
• All microcontrollers can do serial
• Not many can do USB
• Serial is easy, USB is hard

serial terminal from the olde days

Serial Communications
• “Serial” because data is broken down into bits, each
sent one after the other down a single wire.

• The single ASCII character ‘B’ is sent as:

‘B’ = 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 0
= LHLLLLHL
=
HIGH

LOW

• Toggle a pin to send data, just like blinking an LED

• You could implement sending serial data with digitalWrite() and

delay()

• A single data wire needed to send data. One other to receive.

Arduino & USB-to-
serial
Arduino board is really two circuits
 Arduino Mini
Arduino Mini separates the two circuits

Arduino Mini USB adapter Arduino Mini

Arduino to Computer

chip

USB is totally optional for Arduino

But it makes things easier
 Arduino & USB

• Since Arduino is all about serial

• And not USB,
• Interfacing to things like USB flash drives,
USB hard disks, USB webcams, etc. is not
possible
Controlling the Computer

• Can send sensor data from Arduino to

computer with Serial.print()
• There are many different variations to suite
your needs:
Controlling the Computer
You write one program on Arduino, one on the computer

In Arduino: read sensor, send data as byte

In Processing: read the byte, do something with it

Controlling the Computer

• Receiving program on the computer can be

in any language that knows about serial ports
• C/C++, Perl, PHP, Java, Max/MSP,
Python, Visual Basic, etc.
• Pick your favorite one, write some code for
Arduino to control
Controlling Arduino, Again
“SerialReadBlink”

Type a number 1-9

and LED blinks that
many times

Converts typed ASCII value

into usable number

Most control issues are

data conversion issues
 Serial-controlled RGB
“SerialRGBLED”

Send color commands

to Arduino
e.g. “r200”, “g50”, “b0”

Sketch parses what you

type, changes LEDs g50
 Reading Serial Strings
• The function
“Serial.available()” makes
reading strings easier

• Can use it to read all

available serial data from
computer

• The “readSerialString()”
function at right takes a
character string and sticks
available serial data into it
 Piezoelectrics
• Big word – piezein is greek for “squeeze”
• Some crystals, when squeezed, make a spark
• Turns out the process goes the other way too
• Spark a quartz crystal, and it flexes
• Piezo buzzers use this to make sound
(flex something back and forth, it moves air)
 Piezo Buzzers

• Two wires, red & black.

Polarity matters: black=ground
• Apply an oscillating voltage to
make a noise
• The buzzer case supports the
piezo element and has resonant
cavity for sound
 What’s in a Piezo Buzzer?

You can get at the piezo

element pretty easily.

Be careful not to crack

the white disc that is the
actual piezo

Only take it out of its

case to use it as a sensor

another $1.99 I won’t be getting back from Radio Shack

Piezo Buzzer
 Play a Melody
“SoundSerial”

Play the piezo beeper

with the Serial Monitor

Type multiple letters

from “cdefgabC” to
make melodies
Making it Quieter
Easiest way: add a resistor
 Play a Stored Melody
“PlayMelody”

Plays a melody stored

in the Arduino

Could be battery-powered, play

melody on button trigger, control
playback speed with photocell, etc.
 Make a Theremin
“ooo-weee-ooooo”

The original spooky

sound machine

Works by measuring your

body’s electric field

No touching needed!
We’ll use light in lieu of RF Leon Theremin
 Light Theremin
“Theremin”

Move hand over

photocell to change
pitch

Play with val processing & cycles count

to alter sensitivity, pitch and timbre
 Other Serial Devices

to Wi-Fi to Ethernet to graphic LCD

to 8-servo controller
Serial Examples

to Roomba
 Going Further
• Piezo buzzers
• Can hook up multiple buzzers for
polyphonic sound
• Can play waves other than just square
waves using PWM techniques
• Can also be used as input devices (we’ll
cover that later)
 Going Further
• Serial communications
• Not just for computer-to-Arduino
communications
• Many other devices speak serial
• Older keyboards & mice speak are serial
(good for sensors!)
• Interface boards (graphic LCDs, servo
drivers, RFID readers, Ethernet, Wi-Fi)
 Going Further
• RGB LEDS
• You can pretty easily replicate
the Ambient Orb ($150)
functionality
• Make a status display for your
computer
• Computer-controlled accent
lighting (a wash of color
against the walls)
 END Class 2

http://todbot.com/blog/bionicarduino/

Tod E. Kurt
tod@todbot.com