An Uno-based robot chameleon

A Maker by the name of MarkusB recently created a color-changing chameleon robot for his daughter to help illustrate the concept of camouflage.

“My daughter and me continued to study our animal encyclopedia. We found the chameleon,” MarkusB wrote in a blog post describing the project. “I tried to explain [to] her that some species adjust their colors for camouflage in accordance with the vision, but she did not understand, so I built a simple robot chameleon during her afternoon nap.”

The fairly simple circuit includes an Arduino Uno (ATmega328), a TCS3200 color sensor with breakout board, a ping pong ball, resistors and an RGB LED.

The entire build cost a grand total of $10 (excluding the Arduino) and took only two hours to complete. For the next iteration of the robot chameleon, MarkusB will be adding a temperature sensor as a well as a capacitive sensor for touch.

“My daughter is very excited about the little robot chameleon and played a long time with it,” he added. 

”She now understands that some chameleons adjust their colors for camouflage in accordance with [their surroundings] and she learned some names of colors in different languages (German and English).

Interested in learning more about the Uno-based robot chameleon? You can check out MarkusB’s blog post here and HackADay’s write up here.

Peel-and-stick electronics with Circuit Stickers

Circuit Stickers are peel-and-stick electronics for crafting circuits. Makers can easily build glowing, sensing and interactive projects with Circuit Stickers, adding electronics to any sticker-friendly surface including paper, fabric and plastic.

“Building circuits with them is fun and easy – just stick them onto a surface like you would with a normal sticker, and build up a circuit by sticking several stickers together,” the Circuit Sticker crew wrote in a recent Crowd Supply post.

“They’re an approachable way to craft with electronics, whether you’re just starting out with circuits or creating complex interactive artworks.”

Currently, there are four primary categories of Circuit Stickers:

• LED Stickers – Simple LED lights available in white, red, yellow and blue.
• Effects Stickers – Generate an effect to control your LEDs with blink, fade, twinkle and heartbeat.
• Sensors Stickers – Includes a light sensor, a microphone sensor for detecting sound and a trigger circuit.
• Touch sensor/Microcontroller Sticker – Initially configured to to work as a touch sensor, although advanced users can program and customize the on-board ATTiny85 (Atmel) microcontroller (MCU).

“We’ve designed Circuit Stickers to be as easy-to-use as possible, so you don’t need a background in electronics to get started–our interactive sketchbook will teach you the basics,” the Circuit Stickers crew added. “Technically advanced users can program Circuit Stickers and even integrate traditional electronics to create more complex works. Circuit Stickers are also made the work well with a wide range of materials, so you can use whatever art and craft techniques that are most fun and familiar to you.”

Interested in learning more? You can check out the official Circuit Stickers project page on Crowd Supply here.