Handheld color picker for designers
2024
Colorscope
a smart real-life color-picker
Description
- Custom designed adn integrated a PCB around the ATSAMD51J19A-AUT microcontroller
- Displays and logs RGB values and the closest color names for surfaces and objects.
- Helps with design and ideation by showing the complementary color(s) for picked color.
- Uses WiFi to look up the closest color name, making it great for collaboration and discussions between designers and visual artists.
- Logs data—RGB values, closest color names, and complements—onto a microSD card.
- Measures distances (up to 4m) with a Time-of-Flight (ToF) sensor for space planning.
- Detects and displays sound levels (dB) to assist with audio setups.
- Is on a 4-layer PCB, along with a mechanical assembly and battery/charging circuitry
Learning Outcomes
1. Technical Skills & Knowledge
- Circuit board (PCB) design, KiCAD
- System integration product design
- Processor and component selection
- Embedded communication protocols (USB, SPI, I2C, UART, JTAG/SWD),
- Development using a variety of microcontrollers (especially ATSAMD51J19A-AUT)
- Prototyping using dev boards such as Feather M4
- Sourcing electronic parts, creating a functional Bill of Materials (BOM)
- Electronics fundamentals
- Power tree management
- SMD soldering
- Debugging
- Mechanics of linkages
2. General Project/Practical Skills
Systems Engineering: Hardware and software integration; full system design and bringup
Requirement Analysis: Defining product goals and creating a functional brief and requirements.
Documentation: Writing professional product reports and documenting development processes.
Demos
Picking colors (both RGB values and closest named colors) and measuring distances
Thanks to its distance measurement function, when the user gets Colorscope close enough to an object, Colorscope understands that the user is “picking” a color. It activates the LED and normalizes the color according to the known distance. Then, it displays (and logs) the RGB value and the closest color name (scraped from the html color table online).
Sound dB mapping
Colorscope uses a microphone and a custom preamp circuit to detect loudness.
Motivation
The project is of deep interest to me. In addition to wanting to further my engineering skills. I am interested in color theory and visual arts. As an RA, makerspace assistant, and an active member of student organizations (including theater tech and engineering), I design posters and light/sound venues. A handheld color picker can help in the ideation and design. Its sound dB level functionality can help with the audio setup of spaces. Also, I have partial synesthesia, so I think it would be exciting to extend this project to translate between sounds and colors.
Attachments
Technical Documents
EE256_UpdatedProductBrief_EgeTuran
