This week on Maker Update, nineties toy tech with an AI upgrade,
Return of the cyber decks, body bots, a Rubik's cube that solves itself,
And the pickup truck that writes.
Hey, I'm Donald Bell and welcome back to Maker Update,
the show where we update you on cool things makers are making.
How's everybody doing? I hope you're doing well.
I've got a fun show for you.
Let's get started with the project of the week.
Who here is old enough to remember the Talk Boy Deluxe?
It was a voice changing toy from the nineties.
Its claim to fame was helping Macaulay Culkin's character impersonate
his dad over the phone in Home Alone 2
But changing the recordings pitch
by slowing down tape playback is a pretty cheap gimmick.
What we all really wanted was a way to create
a super realistic impersonation of someone's voice.
A way to call in sick from the school and sound like our parents.
Well, thanks to Hung Truong,
The potential for the Talk Boy has finally been realized.
His version, which he calls the Talk Boy Ultra, has been upgraded with A.I. voice cloning software.
Like the original, you press a button, record what you want to say,
and then playback the altered version.
But instead of a pitched down, sleepy version of your own voice,
you can sound like Arnold Schwarzenegger or Barack Obama.
And the really great news is that you don't need much hardware to pull it off.
Inside, Hung has a Raspberry Pi Zero W, a small mic
and the USB card, a cheap USB speaker and an LCD display.
The bad news is that the Pi alone isn't enough to natively process the audio file.
So what Hung's done is set it up as a server that takes the recording
and sends it over to his nearby computer for processing.
The computer then sends the process file back
and the LCD updates to let you know that playback is ready.
Of course, this also means that the bit where you train an A.I.
to clone a new voice is also handled on your main computer.
It's not a point click and clone situation, at least not yet.
I have to admit that underneath the nostalgic thrill of this project, part of me
is also a bit freaked out by the idea of a realistic voice cloning technology
becoming this easy.
Let me know what you think in the comments.
Now for some news.
This year’s, Hackaday Cyberdeck challenge sponsored by Digi-Key is officially underway
This year, there are four special categories:
Ice breaker, for practical builds with impressive power capabilities.
Rom Construct, for highly customized machines.
Dex Dealer for innovations in powering your Cyberdeck,
and Turing Police, for decks that are utilizing some kind of A.I.,
the deadline to enter is August 15th
and you can find a link to details in the description.
More projects!
I'm a little late on this one, but I have to share it in case you are, too.
A small team at the University of Maryland Smart Lab
created this wearable robotics platform called Calico.
It's a combination of reinforced silicone track that can be attached to clothing,
and a small lightweight robot that can navigate along
the track using a pair of wheels that pinch and push it along.
There are some practical ideas demonstrated for fitness
or medical applications, but for me, I love thinking about the possibilities
this opens up for Wearable Companion robots and cosplay.
On Makezine, Takashi Kaburagi provides some tantalizing details around his
Self-Solving Rubik's Cube project.
This is a project that Tyler and I first saw at the 2019 Maker Faire Bay Area.
And though it still seems like a superhuman amount of delicate soldering,
Takashi’s write-up on Makezine
at least illuminates how a project like this is even possible
with a Bill of Materials, CAD models, a wiring diagram, and a snippet of code,
you may be able to piece your own version together.
If nothing else,
though, at least you get an appreciation for how this level of effort
and miniaturization can lead to a result that is indistinguishable from magic.
And one of the most popular, most surprising projects this week
was this video from Ryder Calm Down, showing how you turn this truck's tailgate
into a dot matrix printer. Using a combination of solenoids
relays, a pump and a Raspberry Pi.
Not only does Ryder succeed gloriously with this one,
but he also built a useful local host front end
for entering the message you want to write and the speed you're traveling.
You can find the code on GitHub.
I've got a link in the description.
Now for some tips and tools.
The new editions of the Arduino Uno: the Uno R4 Minima
and the Uno R4 WiFi are now shipping and ready for your next project.
If you missed the announcement back in April,
These are updates to the classic Arduino UNO form factor
with backwards compatible pin out and shield compatibility.
The Minima as the name implies, doesn't have many bells and whistles.
Think of it as a standard UNO, with more ram memory and horsepower.
Priced at $20.
The R4 WiFi though, adds WiFi, bluetooth
QWIIC pins for I2C connections and a built-in real-time clock.
But the big surprise left out of the April announcement
was this built-in 12x8 red led matrix display.
It'll be interesting to see
how people put that to use. The R4 WiFi is priced around $28.
You can find both using the Digi-Key link in the description.
On YouTube, Sam from Look Mum, No Computer pays a visit to artist Lomond Campbell
and gets a tour of some of the amazing sonic sculptures he's created.
If you're interested in the intersection of sound engineering and technology,
there are some really inspiring projects here,
along with some great insights from Lomond.
For example, his use of the geared pager motors
he refers to as GM 10s. They have a built in spring clip
that limits the range of motion, perfect for mallets and percussion.
For this week's Digi-Key spotlight,
Check out this project by M5Stack, published on the Digi-Key blog.
It's an umbrella that's lit up with waterproof addressable LEDs.
It's a very cool effect.
For this build.
They're using the free WLED software for ESP32
programed on an M5Stack ATOM Lite ESP32 board, which is a pretty cool,
small and inexpensive way to get a project like this off the ground.
Check it out.
And that does it for this week's show.
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Big thinks to Digi-Key electronics are making this show possible.
And thank you for watching. I'll see you soon.