Using two Arduino Micros, these parents created a unique Lea shapes puzzle for their daughter Rebecca.

Because of a medical condition, Rebecca will need to have her vision assessed at the age of two or younger. This means that she’ll have to be tested without yet knowing her alphabet, and instead need to be familiar with Lea shapes which can act as a substitute for letters in a vision test. Unfortunately, her hearing is also impaired, meaning that a non-visual type of stimulus is needed to encourage a correct response.

To accomplish this, her parents came up with an excellent puzzle system, where when one of these shapes is dropped into the correct slot, the smart lights in the room change to the corresponding color. It’s an interesting project that will hopefully help with a pressing need.

In terms of hardware, a Raspberry Pi 3 is used as a central hub along with a Hue smart lights bridge, which is paired with a couple of Arduinos and 2.4GHz radio modules that handle the wireless communication between the two devices.

You can see more about this build on their blog here and more background on their lighting system here.

Engineering student Federico Terzi has built an impressive computer interface device reminiscent of a Wiimote.

When talking in person,  you can express meaning using facial expressions, and your hands. Usually this acts to add emphasis to a statement or perhaps to point out a certain object, but what if you could actually type letters based on how your hands move?

Terzi’s aptly named “Gesture Keyboard” does just this, using an Arduino Pro Micro, an MPU-6050 accelerometer, and an HC-06 Bluetooth module for sending signals to his laptop. A Python library using Scikit-learn’s SVM (Support Vector Machine) algorithm then translates the motion readings into characters that appear on the screen.

You can find the code and more information on Terzi’s GitHub page.

Arduino Day is now less than three weeks away, and we cannot wait to celebrate with everyone on April 1st. So far, we’ve received hundreds of submission from all across the world and are constantly updating our map with new events — which by the way, if yours has been approved, do not forget to add the agenda!

As we prepare for Arduino Day, we’ve got three more announcements to share:  

• NEW DEADLINE: The call for submissions has been extended until March 18th! Remember, participation is open to everyone and anyone can organize event of their own Submit yours here!

• OFFICIAL ARDUINO DAY IN MALMÖ: Aside from our festivities in Turin, the Arduino team will host another official event in Malmö. The program will include a showcase of Maker projects, free activities for kids, and a lineup of talks. Live in Sweden or nearby? Join us!

• ONLINE EVENTS: Not only will the Arduino community come together at various physical locations throughout the globe, but now several celebrations this year will also be taking place virtually. If you want to host an online event — such as a hangout or a live streamed workshop (we are very open!) — please contact arduinoday2017@arduino.cc with your idea, and we’ll get back to you!

Last but not least, do not forget to post and invite your friends via social media using the hashtag #ArduinoD17

If you’ve played Team Fortress or its sequel TF2, you’ve certainly run into a sentry gun. This unit can be set up by an engineer character to guard various positions, and looks like something that could make an amazing prop.

YouTuber “henry3136” apparently agrees, and spent an estimated 400-500 hours building and programming his own out of cardboard, plastic bottles, and a few 3D-printed bits.

His Arduino-controlled gun pans back and forth using a servo and “fires” whenever it senses a target with its ultrasonic sensor. An Adafruit Audio FX Sound Board helps produce some fun effects, while the barrel moves in and out to scare off the bad guys.

You can see it in action below!

Imgurian “ElectricYFronts” has created an Arduino-controlled solar heating system for his kids’ paddling pool.

Small semi-portable above ground pools can be fun, but are generally not heated. The “Solar Paddle” system, however, raises the temperature of the pool from a chilly 68 degrees Fahrenheit to a much warmer 83 degrees (20 to 28 Celsius). It does this by piping water into and out of the pool, then heating it in over 200 yards of black watering pipe on top of a shed.

Water is cycled via an impeller pump, which is powered by a solar panel along with a battery to keep power even over fluctuations. A few buttons and an LCD panel allow things to be changed around without opening up the Arduino Uno’s enclosure.

You can see more on how this heater was made on Imgur.

As Maker Alex Gyver points out in his video, Chinese bike computers are quite cheap, but “why not?” It’s a great question, and one that motivates many of the hacks seen here, including his mountain bike speedometer.

Although he could have simply used a numerical display to show how fast his bike was going, he instead employed a small servo to point to the speed like an analog gauge. The custom speedometer is based on an Arduino Nano, and wheel revolutions are measured by a magnetic and Hall effect sensor.

This may seem like a silly project, but if you need to take a very short glance at something, analog gauges tend to be much easier to read than digital. Perhaps this concept could be quite useful! You can see exactly how to make this hack on Instructables and in his video here with a few action shots. Code can be found on GitHub if you’d like to check that out as well!

In his quest to create “the coolest wall-mounted bottle opener in the entire world,” it would appear that YouTuber “Never Stop Seeking” has succeeded.

As seen below, the infinity mirror-style unit is made of plexiglass and two-way mirror film, and equipped with Arduino Uno-controlled RGB LED strips that are activated by a proximity sensor as you open a beer or soda. He even included a magnetic catch for his bottle caps!

Want to build one of your own? Good news, Never Stop Seeking plans on sharing more details along with a how-to video in the coming days.

Given an input and some sort of indicator, is there any device that can’t be hacked into a timepiece? With the help of an Arduino Nano and an ESP8266 module, Guilio Pons has created a unique clock out of a 1950s-era multimeter.

Pons’ project not only displays time with an indicator originally meant to reveal electrical values, but is also able to output sounds as needed using a speaker recovered from an old toy. He integrated three LEDs as well as a PIR sensor, so the unit can light up at night.

PWM control from the Arduino takes care of moving the gauge, while the ESP8266 allows the time to be synchronized via the Internet and the alarm adjusted over WiFi.

Want to retrofit a vintage tester of your own? Be sure to check out the Pons’ entire log on Hackaday.io. You can find the software library that he used to play sounds here.

Using a stepper motor, an Arduino Micro, and various mechanical bits, “Max Maker” shows us how to motorize a camera slider.

According to his video below, “There are many cheap sliders available, but none that are motorized.” On the other hand, in this project he demonstrates that with a little bit of work, and an excellent attention to detail, you can make the conversion yourself.

Even if you’re not interested in this kind of application, the video reveals some interesting tricks, such as transferring a hole pattern using tape at 0:30, and using nail polish/recessed lettering to label switches at 3:55. The slider can be set to slide down the rail between 10 seconds and 8 hours depending on your video or photography needs. Video results, seen around 5:00 in, are really amazing!

You can find more details on how to create a slider like this on the project’s Instructables page.

Using a couple Arduinos, a team of Makers at a recent McHacks 24-hour hackathon developed a speech-to-sign language automaton.

Alex Foley, along with Clive Chan, Colin Daly, and Wilson Wu, wanted to make a tool to help with translation between oral and sign languages. What they came up with was an amazing animatronic setup that can listen to speech via a computer interface, and then translate it into sign language.

This device takes the form of two 3D-printed hands, which are controlled by servos and a pair Arduino Unos. In addition to speech translation, the setup can sense hand motions using Leap Motion’s API, allowing it to mirror a person’s gestures.

You can read about the development process in Foley’s Medium write-up, including their first attempt at control using a single Mega board.