internship week 5

Fifth week of my internship here. Progress has been good and continuous. I have ordered a few devices from Adafruit such as the screen and the USB dongle. I connected up the screen to the breadboard to show a few images. The applications of this screen would obviously be to show a clock face or certain images. I also installed the dongle to my laptop. I also boght a Google Nexus 4 smartphone so i could go into researching of the applications market. To my surprise, there have already been several completed or testing Android applications which uses the Bluetooth LE function to communicate with the board such as Nordic Bluetooth application or the Red Bear Lab Bluetooth controller which are all quite cool. I plan to do something like that for my product. That's the end of my update to the hardware part.

I also had to send my prototype for printing in Singapore Polytechnic. I designed a C4D object which would be the body of my product. Initially i thought i could get to use the rapid prototyping room in SP to do the printing, however when i went down the lab technician told me i had to get approvals to use the 3D printer in school. i sent an email to my course chairman and he helped me to forward the email to the in charge of the MAE department, however i received no reply for the whole week, thus i decided to give up on that idea and instead just used the 3D printer which the DEB lab provides. It is just a makerbot and i had to learn how to print the models all by myself. Some processes include downloading the makerware software and changing it into xtl file before converting it into another file frmat before the 3D printer would even accept.

While waiting for the 3D printer to print, i did not waste the time i spent in SP, i also researched on how to create the Bluetooth LE application on eclipse, even learning various videos tutorial from Youtube. I learnt how to use the sample application in which a user provided on Github. All the approvals problems wasted my first trip to SP as by the time i could get to the 3D printer in the DEB lab, it was already too late as i have also not installed any of the programs. Thus the most regretful part of this week is i had to spend two days in SP before i could even complete a small 3D printing.

On friday, i also met up with my supervisor in the morning and told them about my problems regarding the lack of input and output ports which was available on the small Rfduino board and thus he handed me another microcontroller which was slightly bigger but had more digital and analogue pins which i could use thus i started from square one, downloading all the applications need to programme the board.

That concludes my hectic week 5 of rushing from my office to SP to and fro. Hope the following weeks will be better and that the progress of my board would steadily improve.

internship week 4

Fourth week of my internship here. i am finally getting used to the pace of work and the demands of my internship. The progress of my product is going into the fabrication part and like i said last week. I spent week 4 completing up the strap for my product or smartwatch. I hand sewn the pieces of leather together leaving a gap at the top to ensure that i would still be able to edit it there were any changes. As i expected, the strap was more secured after sewing it together and obviously it does not split anymore. Regarding the main body of the product which was the casing, i designed another model with all the screen and strap size taken into considerations. I used the Cinema 4D program which i also used for my PDR module this year. I created it and would send it for 3D printing in school in the next week. That marks the end of my progress for the hardware part of my product.

The other thing that i was racking my brains for this week would have to be the game creation part. Since last week i used stencyl, i changed to the Unity 3D and started creating a game. Since DEB does not teach you anything in game creation, this was a platform which was seriously alien to me. I started with the beginner tutorial on the Unity 3D website and downloaded the available assets. Assets are actually resources in which Unity 3D create for you to aid you in the learning process. Some of the objects also known as 3D renders were all created beforehand, even background designs were given to give you a better understanding. I thus created the game till it was fully functional before i started out on the FPS- first person shooter game. I started with a few basic assets which was available on the assets store. I then completely finished the game and could successfully move the player to explore the map while being able to shoot with a gun. I spent the whole week thinking of how to animate my game and it was really a new experience for me. i finally understand that game creation was actually not as easy as it seems to be, thus i would appreciate good graphics games in the future. I then continued to researched on how to edit the script of the player so that it would be able to incorporate the gyroscope and accelerometer sensors. this was another huge challenge which i really need to think over. I went online to research but could not find anything as the Rfduino communication to Unity 3D is a more advanced issue as Rfduino was a new programming board and users have not experimented it. Thus i decided to leave it to next week to do more advanced research.

Actually that sums up my week 4, working progressively on both the hardware and software of my product and working towards my final end goal which is a working prototype. I really hope that i would be able to overcome the difficulties about the game.

Internship week 3

Third week at NUS KEIO CUTE Center. Things that i have been required to do just gets more and more difficult. From learning how to program a new microcontroller board to basic and simple application and game creation, allowing me to learn many things which i missed out in my education at SP.

Since last week, i have completed my prototype with the materials i bought. i decided to do a leather strap which i super glued together. The result was however not that satisfactory as the strap would split open upon excessive bending thus i have decided the only way to make it better would be to sew the two pieces of cloth together. That wold be the only way to beautify it yet make it durable to the excessive bending.

Last week i used the Stencyl game creator to start on a basic game however the graphics of the platform was clearly created for the production of 2D retro games such as Mario and games like Angry Birds which was not something i wanted cause it would be quite useless to purchase a gadget to play such games thus i decided to download Unity 3D game creator as it provides games tutorials to beginners in game developments which are quite easy to follow. They also provide you with assets from their library to help in the process of game creation. I also intend to create a simple FPS game to show how this product can be used for it.

I also went ahead to purchase the various devices and equipment i needed for the project online. I ordered an 1.8 inch TFT LCD display and a USB Bluetooth 4.0 dongle from Adafruit, an US supplier for such components. The screen would be another feature of the watch, and i decided to use this screen as there were many tutorials online from the supplier website too which would make the programming and installation much more efficient. The dongle would be the device in which would connect the Rfduino the any desktop or laptop which thw user would be using,

The longer i work in NUS, the more i find that a researcher job is actually quite interesting an fun at the same time. The product or device you create is like another identity of yourself. It all depends on what you want to put in the device. You can make it very simple which results in no USP for the device. You must also put yourself in the shoes of the user to think for their uses and application and whether it would be comfortable and at the same time useful for them to use the product that you create. You must also keep the cost of the components cheap so that the final production cost is cheap and that would result in a more competitive market pricing for the product in that specific market.

Internship week 2

The second week of my internship at NUS KEIO CUTE Center. Since the last post, i have succeeded in achieving the results from the sensors on the serial monitor of the programming IDE. I have thus proceeded to creating the prototype watch strap which i have planned and designed for in the first week,

I had to think of the suitable material and how i would build up the watch strap. It as to be flexible yet strong at the same time to be able to achieve the best results in its applications. I could not use plastic as it was too soft and may break easily upon repeated bending of the watch around the wrist. I also could not use certain type of metals as it may be too hard and would restrict the bending of the watch around the wrist. Thus i proceeded to the Artfriend branch at Bras Besah to purchase materials for my prototype. I have decided on a metal piece which could be used for modelling of architecture buildings and rapid prototyping. I bought two different versions to try out which one was the best. I also bought a piece of leather to simulate the maerials of the actual watch strap so that the user would feel comfortable when using it.

On a side note, the other task for the second week would be to think of applications for my project. i decided that games and a mobile application would be the best use for this product thus i also set out in creating an Android application using Eclipse which i installed in my computer and the creation of a game which should be simple enough to display the functions of this product. I also installed the Nvidia game creater and Stencyl so i could start on the job.

The tasks this week make me feel satisfied as i got to learn more things which i did not learn in my education time at Singapore Poly. The process of Ideation of a product to creating the prototype and thinking of applications for that product and thinking of how to appeal to potential buyer or investors of that product. I also had to learn how to do many things by myself as the researchers here expect you to learn all the things you do not know by yourself so that you can learn something from it. I am appreciative that my supervisors still assist me sometimes when i am not clear.

I look forward to the remaining 14 weeks of my internship and would work hard to complete the final goal which would be the final working prototype.