Laser Cutter Fun 2

Owls

Student Graduation Cap Topper

Millersville University

Jägermeister

Olaf from Frozen

Rutgers Scarlet Knight

Raspberry Pi Picture Frame Post 14 Final

At this point I believe the project is complete minus one part. Finishing the frame but that is going to wait until the final user chooses how they want it finished. Major software changes since last time where

• When pictures are re-sized they are moved to a new folder then the originals get deleted. 
• Frame can now be programmed to turn the screen on or off at given times because it knows if the frame is on or not. 
• Divided some of the scripts up into separate scripts for easier troubleshooting 
• Made the button to turn off the screen have 3 functions (no limit to number of functions)
• 1 turn screen off. (quick press)
• 2 preform a sync with google (press until blue led turn off about 3 seconds)
• 3 power off the pi (press until pi starts shutting down. about 5 seconds)

Overall I am really happy with how the project came out. All of the individual pieces have come together to make a really neat picture frame that looks exceptionally nice. Here is a copy of all of my scripts used and Here is the stuff for the weather,If you have any questions all you have to do is ask.

       

Mount holding monitor in frame

Power button with Blue LED

Back View

Raspberry Pi Picture Frame Post 13 Update

The picture frame has come a long way since the last post. I now have the wooden frame for it built and almost done but we will come back to that in a minute. Since the last update I have completely remade some of the electronics. The only reason I did this is because I fried 2 different wireless receivers for my button inputs and since I wanted to add a few more items I decided to basically start from scratch. Beyond the remote control for input I added the following items

• On board power switch that turns the monitor on and off
• The switch has a LED in it which will tell you the status of the screen
• Input for monitoring status of screen

Above you can see my old setup (on the bottom) and my new setup (on the top). Yes it is probably 3-4 times bigger but you never know what you may want to add to the project down the line so I left it big. It helps that I have excess space so I can easily leave it big. On my old setup I had the resistor divider n the back of the wireless receiver. This time I have it on the perf board. To add the power button I had a few options. 

1. Wire the button in parallel with the original monitor button
2. Wire the button in parallel with the remote button that tells the pi to turn the screen on or off
3. Wire the button to a new input

I liked the hardware approach better than the software approach so that took off one option. To keep the number of wires coming off my new board to the bare minimum I decided to wire the switch in parallel with the wireless receiver. The power button I used is from adafruit and can be found here

Instead of having 4 wires coming back from the switch (LED +, LED -, Switch Common, Switch Normally Open) I only have 3 (5v, Switch Nomally Open, LED -) I have done me best to make each different part removable in case something breaks it should be pretty easy to replace. Since everyone likes schematics you can see mine below. 

You will notice that I also have a transistor setup to switch the LED on instead of relying on the PI to supply enough current. I also wanted it to run off 5 volts instead of the 3.3 the pi will put out. There is also a transistor right by the monitor button. At this point I have not done any additional coding but all of the hardware is now done.

Now on to the actual wooden Frame. Due to the thickness of the monitor I new the frame was going to be thick and it doesn't bother me one bit.

I got the wood from my local Lowes. Each side is made up of a 1/2 x 3 and 1/4 x 1.5 glued together.

I glued them together mitered the corners and glued it all together to make a nice frame. Then I cut it down to a little over the thickness of the frame so it wouldn't be to excessively thick. I still need to add a hole for the button and make a notch bottom center for the power cord to come out in case it gets hung on a wall. 

Next Post