For this assignment, the task was to create an unusual switch (that opens and closes a circuit) using Arduino.
Inspiration
Anyone who knows me knows how much I love plushies! When I started brainstorming project ideas, I wanted to create something cute that included two of my own plushies—Beany the bear and Snowball the penguin. I was also inspired by the movie Inside Out, especially how the character Joy is represented with a warm yellow glow. This gave me the idea to create a scene where one of my plushies says “hi” to the other, sparking a little moment of joy between them.
Concept
The main concept behind my project is to create a glowing yellow heart made of LEDs that lights up when Snowball places his hand on Beany’s shoulder, representing a moment of joy. Using Arduino, I wanted to wire a small circuit with conductive foil attached to each plushie. When the two plushies make contact, the conductive foils complete the circuit, sending a signal through the Arduino to illuminate the LED heart.
Implementation
To bring my idea to life, I started by cutting a piece of cardboard and arranging spots for the LEDs in the shape of a heart. After placing the LEDs, I wired them in parallel, connecting their negative terminals to the ground on the Arduino board. I connected the positive terminals of the LEDs to a 330-ohm resistor, which was then connected to one piece of conductive foil on one of the plushies. The other piece of conductive foil, attached to the second plushie, was connected to the Arduino’s 5V terminal. This setup meant that when the two plushies “touched,” the circuit would complete through the resistor, causing the LED heart to glow.
Here’s a picture of just the LED heart and its wiring:
When I filmed the final product, I got a (teeny-tiny) bit carried away and ended up creating a short, movie-like video with the Inside Out theme song as background music. It really added to the emotion I wanted to capture in this project :))
Reflections and Further Improvements
Overall, I’m pretty happy with how this project turned out! The wiring was a bit challenging due to the number of LEDs I used, which sometimes caused the wires to get tangled, but overall, the process went smoothly. As mentioned previously, I also invested some time in filming the final product to give it a more story-like feel.
For future improvements, I might consider adding some sort of sound element that plays whenever the circuit is completed. It would also be nice to make the setup more compact or even fully portable. Lastly, I’d love to explore adding different light patterns or colors to show various emotions, which would create even more expressive interactions between the plushies.