20 smart crowdfunding campaigns you may want to back this week

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Every Friday, we’re taking a look at some of the smartest, most innovative projects that caught our attention on Kickstarter and Indiegogo over the last seven days. 

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LightBlue Bean+

This Arduino-compatible board is programmed wirelessly using Bluetooth Low Energy. Punch Through Design has well surpassed its goal of $30,000.

Buddy

This LED collar uses GPS, Bluetooth and Wi-Fi technologies to keep your dog safe while tracking and organizing their activities in real-time. Squeaker is currently $281,233 on Kickstarter.

Node.IT

This super small, modular set of boards is like LEGO for building IoT devices. Pontus Oldberg is currently seeking $4,058 on Kickstarter.

NFire 1

This completely expandable 3D printer adapts to your needs, whether it’s doubling its height or upgrading to a dual extruder. NFire Labs is currently seeking $46,788 on Kickstarter.

Smitch

This simple-to-install smart switch lets you control your lights wirelessly via Bluetooth. Brothers Lab is currently seeking $21,949 on Kickstarter.

BedJet

This ultra-rapid cooling and heating system for your bed hacks into your body’s natural biorhythm to wake you up gradually. BedJet has well surpassed its goal of $24,000.

Digital Potbelly

This open source, fully-programmable thermometer makes brewing beer at home easier than ever before. Zach King is currently seeking $8,800 on Kickstarter.

LIVALL

This smart bike helmet features a built-in microphone, a three-axis G-sensor, Bluetooth speakers and LEDs to enhance the cycling experience. LIVALL Riding has well surpassed its goal of $20,000 on Indiegogo.

YONO

This wearable accessory fits in your ear to track ovulation and monitor hormonal health, helping women take advantage of their fertility windows. Yono Labs is currently seeking $30,000 on Kickstarter.

Ola Fingerprint Smart Lock

This smart lock is equipped with Bluetooth connectivity and capacitive fingerprint technology, making it not only keyless but phoneless as well. Ola is currently seeking $25,000 on Indiegogo.

SmartPrompt Pan

This smart pan boasts an LCD touchscreen display that enables you to easily follow step-by-step cooking instructions. The Key Ingredient is currently seeking $40,000 on Indiegogo.

Nectro

This unique pen allows you to draw functional circuits right on paper or specially-coated transparent film. Nectro is currently seeking $38,131 on Kickstarter.

Exahome

This smart home automation system will reduce your energy consumption and maximize efficiency by sensibly managing all available resources. Exahome is currently seeking $80,000 on Indiegogo.

MagneTag

These wearable sensors can electronically detect blows from magnetically-enhanced foam swords, ninja stars and blaster darts. Adam Cohen is currently seeking $50,000 on Kickstarter.

HAL-e

This DIY, Arudino-powered kit demystifies robotics by illustrating the basic principles of mechanics, electronics and computation. HAL-e Industries is currently seeking $6,000 on Kickstarter.

PFShield

This shield is a simple way to interface LEGO power functions, motors, Bluetooth and Arduino. Michael Hudson is currently seeking $1,046 on Kickstarter.

AQUA

This battery-free, lightweight amp works with your headphones and smartphones to improve the output audio quality. NEXUM has well surpassed its goal of $16,000 on Kickstarter.

Crypta

This fingerprint-protected USB device allows you to log into any account on any computer with just your fingerprint. Crypta is currently seeking $80,000 on Kickstarter.

HelioVault

This high-capacity, portable power bank is designed for maximum efficiency. PowerFilm Solar is currently seeking $250,000 on Kickstarter.

Formula AllCode

This Bluetooth-enabled robot buggy is programmable via Python, AppBuilder, Flowcode 6, Matlab, LabView, C, C# and more. Matrix TSL is currently seeking $18,737 on Kickstarter.

Did you happen to miss last week’s notable campaigns? If so, you can check them out here. Also, if your project is powered by Atmel MCUs and you’ve been featured on our blog, be sure to download the respective badges here for use in your ongoing marketing efforts. 

Node.IT is like the LEGO for building IoT devices

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Node.IT is a super small and extendable Internet of Things system for Makers. 

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It’s safe to say that one size does not fit all when it comes to DIY electronics. This has led countless Makers to embrace interchangeable, easy-to-use components like littleBits when beginning to tinker around with an idea. With aspirations of becoming the LEGO for the Internet of Things, Pontus Oldberg has developed a family of modules with different functions that can be stacked to create wide range of smart projects.

The concept for Node.IT was first conceived following the launch of the highly-popular ESP8266, an inexpensive, self-contained Wi-Fi SoC. Oldberg and his team had explored various ways of interfacing the device to other processors, but not before long discovered that the chip was already powerful enough to perform most tasks. And so, the ESP8266 was chosen to be at the heart of Node.IT’s base controller, which packs 4Mb of Flash, an efficient voltage regulator and can be programmed via microUSB.

“We quickly realized that if we created a base controller with a minimum set of features such as the ESP8266, a USB to Serial transceiver and a simple voltage regulator you end up with a completely autonomous board that can be hooked up to a USB port and programmed directly, without any other circuitry,” Oldberg writes.

This steered its creators toward the ESP210, a 27mm x 17mm module complete with everything needed to configure the device and hook it up to a wireless network. While the MCU itself was very expandable and provided easy access to all the GPIOs of the processor, it was rather cumbersome to build some of the necessary add-ons. Subsequently, Oldberg designed what he calls the +One and WorkStation boards to establish an entire infrastructure around the ESP210.

Similar to the Microduino mCookie and several others, the +One boards can be stacked on top of one another with LEGO-like ease. There’s currently a handful of +Ones available, including a Li-ion charger, an enviornmental sensor, a GPIO expander, a four-channel 12/16-bit A/D converter, a battery-backed real-time clock, as well as a two-channel DC driver that is in the works.

The final member of the family, the WorkStation, acts as the carrier board for the entire Node.IT stack. Equipped with an Atmel | SMART SAM D10, these microcontrollers expand the ESP210 with up to eight analog (12- or 16-bit) ADC channels, eight normal GPIO lines, and six timer/counter/PWM pins.

“The +One boards works very much like Lego bricks in that they plug on to the headers of the ESP210. The WorkStation boards can be considered the reverse of the +One boards in that the ESP210 plugs in to the WorkStation board. This way we can build add-on boards that can build in every direction.”

Makers can code their devices using a custom Ecosphere program, which was built around the Arduino IDE. Oldberg shares, “Any software libraries that are required for +One or WorkStation boards or features required for the ESP210 to do its job will be developed for the Arduino SDK. By using the Arduino IDE and its vast library of functionality you as a developer have endless possibilities when it comes to develop functionality for your systems.”

Sound like an IoT system you’d like to try? Head over to its Kickstarter page here. You can also find all of the drivers and related software for the Node.IT project on its GitHub page.