start cad-in the helmet design

i finally started working on the design of the helmet-helmet thingy! this is the hardest part for me, since i'm not super familiar with cad, and 3d design in general. i'm using this lesser known cad called "shapr3d" because it's free and also looked pretty user friendly, soooooo yeah. i started by making a hole cutout for the led matrix to go in front, and made the base around it. the helmet is supposed to fit onto a separate bike helmet (which is weirdly sized), so i have to make sure to design around that.

here's the design i got to today:

i think it looks pretty good, and i even added holes for the wires and stuff! the raspberry pi is placed on the outside, then secured with screws. i tried to make a hole where the camera is supposed to be on top, but i didn't finish. i'm really worried about if this design will work with the bike helmet, since i lowkey just estimated the sizes for the helmet... uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh i hope it ok.

on a programming note, i still have to figure out how to do the frickin mouth shapes thingy, which is actually a bit harder than i originally thought.

programming the pi + more research

i got the voice changer and the live webcam feed working on the pi! this is basically all the easy programming parts done. all that's left to do in terms of programming is just making the led matrix work, and somehow detecting the sounds coming from my mouth and showing it on the led matrix (somehow).

i'm ordering the led matrix off of amazon instead of aliexpress, because i lowkey don't have a lot of time to finish this project (halloween is 2 weeks away!), and amazon is just way faster.

the next step for this project is designing the structure of the actual helmet, and actually make it somehow fit onto my weirdly shaped bike helmet:

here's my setup rn for programming:

(the gif might be a liiiitle bit laggy)

i think i might just make something like the frame of a box, then maybe put cardboard pieces into slots??? i don't really want to 3d print the entire thing, since it seems kinda like a waste of filament.

did some more research and made a bom

i basically researched about how i'm gonna make this thing, and made a list of parts i needed, and things i already have that i could use for the project. the final list is something like this:

• led matrix
• old bike helmet or something like that
• m3 machine screws
• mini usb microphone
• white petg filament
• power banks (already have)
• raspberry pi 3 (already have)
• aux cable (already have)
• small display (already have)
• usb webcam (already have)
• speaker (already have)

that's pretty much the entire list! i think the next step is to go to goodwill and look for some cheap used helmets that maybe i could take apart and use as the base of the design. until i have the dimensions of the actual helmet, i feel like it's kinda hard to design. but yeah

i was ideating real good (i wrote a blog post)

so 2 days ago i went to the bay area maker faire, which is basically a giant convention with people making cool stuff, like electronics, robots, art, and costumes. i saw a bunch of interesting things there, like some indie games and stuff, but one kinda stood out a lot for some reason (idk why).

i saw a robot head thingymajig where it's literally just a box with a screen on the front side of it, and you can wear it and pretend you're a clanka. i was curious, so i looked it up. here's a photo of the thing:

stack-san

another interesting booth that caught my eye was the CyberDragon. it's basically a bunch of adafruit led matrix panels stuck to a helmet, and loaded with custom animations to make it look like a dragon. the single guy who made it takes it to raves, and is starting to sell them for like 3000 dollars. here's a photo

CyberDragon (bestseller in the furry community i'm sure!)

so how do these 2 projects tie into possibly my next project??? here's how: halloween costume

i had a random idea to maybe dress up as a clanker for halloween, and just put a box on my head with an led matrix on the front, and make some cool procedural animations to go along with it! i took some inspiration for the animations looking at tokyo machine's glassess and also a little robot dude made by dasai called mochi 3

DASAI MOCHI 3 (apparently it's for driving???)

Tokyo Machine's glasses look cool!

so yeah! that's pretty much how i want the style to be like, but i haven't decided on the specifics yet. i realized pretty early that i will have to figure out how to actually see through the headpiece, since the led matrix is opaque. i looked for transparent led matrices, but was out of luck since no one really sells them (and they're expensive). i eventually thought of using some kind of periscope system to use mirrors to bounce light into my eyes so i could see. it honestly seems kinda janky, so i don't know how well it'll work.

robo sounds

ok so while i was thinking about all this stuff, scope creep started to kick in, and i was like: "hey why can't i add a voice changer to it, so i actually sound like a frickin clanker? why not???" and so i started looking into ways i could add a stupid microphone to the inside, and attach a speaker to the outside, and also still somehow have enough portable power to power this entire thng.

the tech

after thinking about this thing for some time, i have come up with a list of supplies:

• cardboard/3d printed frame (maybe fixed on bike helmet?)
• raspberry pi 3 b+
• 2 portable power banks (both 5v)
• my webcam (used as microphone lol)
• some kinda of speaker
• a bunch of mirrors
• large square head sized led matrix (roughly 6x6 in)

ok that's a pretty big list actually wow.

Waveshare 64x64 LED Matrix Panel

i think the most crucial part of this project is probably the ability to see out of the box, since you can't really just be walking around blind with this thing. i am also not completely sure if the audio thing would work, since there might be some delay or something idk.

welp, let's get to work i guess.

this was taken from my blog at deltea.space