What's the Buzz?

My project is called, "What's The Buzz?" and it is an interactive object that symbolizes the interplay between a bee and a flower. This project is meant to provide entertainment to kids and adults alike; while being a form of entertainment this project also serves the purpose of educating young kids on how bees and flowers are related within nature. This project combined coding with physical fabrication to create a unique perspective on an element of real life.

My main inspiration for this project roots back to when I was in 6th grade. We were growing our own flowers in our science class, and my teacher had found a dead bee nest. My teacher took the dead bees and put them on sticks. My classmates and I went around pollinating our flowers with the dead bees. This memory has stuck with me for years and helped inspire my love for bees. I feel that physical ways of learning help create more vivid memories that stay with you for years; I really wanted to do this with this project. I wanted to make something interactive and memorable to my desired audience. I also wanted to make people overall more interested in bees because bees are on the brink of going extinct if we do not protect them. I want my project to entertain, educate, interest, and guide people in the goal to become more interested in bees and aim to protect them. Bees are living creatures just like us, and they are extremely important to our ecosystem and way of life.

The flower component and the bee component each had their own separate board, so in total the project used two arduino boards to create multiple interactions for its audience. The flower has leds and a led strip coded in that light up using a reed sensor that reacts to magnets. I put magnets in the bee's head, so that when the bee's head get close to the reed sensor within the flower the reed sensor sends a signal to the arduino board telling the leds and the led strip to light up.

The bee component allows for the user to make the bee buzz and vibrate, ultimately symbolizing the real aspects of a bee and giving kids a closer look and feel of what bees are like within them having to experience a potential bee sting. Inside the stinger of the bee is a touch sensor, so when the user touches the stinger the touch sensor sends a signal to its arduino board to tell the vibration motors to vibrate and the buzzer to make buzzing noises.

I would love to do future iterations of this project and make it even more interactive. I would love to create a variety of different types of pollinators (bees, hummingbirds, butterflies, etc.) and the types of flowers they pollinate and really push the educational aspect of the project. Users would be able to pickup the various animals and figure out which flowers each pollinates by the reaction they get when they bring it close to one of the flowers. Everything would be labeled, so that the users can learn scientific names besides the general names.

(2) Breadboards

(1) Flower Pot

(1) Fake Flower

(2) Googly Eyes

(1) Reed Sensor

(2) Arduino Nano

(2) 9 Volt Batteries

(1) Styrofoam Board

(2) Styrofoam balls: one smaller and one bigger

Pom poms

Multiple Magnets

Multiple pieces of felt (black, yellow, and white)

Multiple pipe cleaners

Regular wire

Brown yarn

Leds/LedStrips

Jumper Wires

The circuit with the leds is my flower circuit, and the circuit with the vibration motors is my bee circuit. Both circuits are running with a 9 volt battery source. The flower circuit has an input of reed sensor, which is either open or closed. When the reed sensor is closed, the leds and led strip will receive power and light up. When the reed sensor is open, the leds and led strip will receive no power. In the bee circuit, the input is a touch sensor. When the touch sensor is closed, the buzzer and the vibration motors will receive power. When the touch sensor is open, the buzzer and the vibration motors will not receive power.

These two diagrams show how interaction is incorporated into my project. The project has multiple layers of interaction. The project interacts with the user through the bee component, and the bee interacts with the flower component; therefore, not only is there user interaction, but also interaction between various pieces of the project. When the user touches the stinger on the bee, the touch sensor recognizes this interaction and signals for the buzzer and three vibration motors to go off and send an output to the user. When the user brings the bee's head (which is full of magnets) close to the flower, the reed sensor takes in this information and outputs two leds on a strip and two regular leds; in my case, it produces two green leds and two yellow leds.

For my flower circuit, I have two green leds, a led strip, and a reed sensor all hooked up in the final view. In the final view all the green cords, with the exception of the led strip (yellow cord), are all leading to the flower. I tried to keep my board neat and use reds for power and blues/blacks for ground. In addition, I also have a 9 volt battery hooked in the final photo. My reed sensor is hooked up to pin 3. My two regular leds are hooked up to pins 4 and 6. My led strip is hooked up to pin 10. This board allows for the reed sensor to send a signal when it detects magnets; When this signal is sent, power is distributed to the led outputs.

For my bee circuit, I have a touch sensor, a buzzer, and three vibration motors hooked up in the final result; in addition, I also included a 9 volt battery so that the bee can be mobile and make my project much easier to interact with. In this circuit, I tried to follow my example in the flower circuit and mostly use red jumper wires for power and black jumper wires for ground. In the final photos, I used blue to indicate my outputs (my buzzer and my three vibration motors). My touch sensor is hooked up to pin 3. My buzzer is hooked up to pin 10. My three vibration motors are hooked up to pin 5, pin 6, and pin 7. This board allows for the touch sensor to send a signal when it is touched; when this occurs, power is distributed to the buzzer and the three vibration motors.

Whats The Buzz

Here is the link to the arduino codes used for my project; I used the program GitHub and included their logo. This link includes both the flower code and the bee code. The flower code defines my reed sensor, two leds, and two leds within a led strip. The reed sensor communicates to the board when a magnet is near and tells the leds to light up when this is "true". If there is not a magnet nearby, the reed sensor communicates "false" and the leds do not light up. My bee code defines my buzzer, three vibration sensors, and a touch sensor. My touch sensor also communicates true or false. It communicates true when touch occurs and tells the buzzer and vibration sensors to go off. When it communicates false, the vibration sensors and the buzzer remain quiet.

For my flower fabrication, I used materials I was able to get from the craft store: fake flower, a flower pot, and some brown yarn. I decided to use "already made" materials because the fabrication for my bee required a lot of extra time, and I was on a time restraint for this project. I wanted to hide the arduino board, so I decided this pot would be the best option; I was able to easily hide my board and still control my project because I was using a 9 volt battery as my power source rather than using a usb cord to connect to my laptop. For all my jumper wires, I punctured holes through the multiple layers of the flower and then pushed the jumper wires through those holes. I reconnected the leds and the reed sensor on the top; I already had the led strip soldered, so I did the same with the puncturing of holes but inserted the wires in from the top to the bottom unlike the other jumper wires. After all the wires were settled within the flower, I reconnected them all to my board. Since I went the battery route, I also included a switch that I had sticking outside of the pot, making it easy to turn the battery on or off.

For my bee fabrication, I used a wide variety of materials to make my project come alive. I used felt, styrofoam balls, styrofoam board, googly eyes, pipe cleaners, wire, pom poms, a hinge and lock system, magnets, and hot glue to produce my interpretation of a bee. I started by gluing magnets into the head (the smaller styrofoam ball); I wanted the magnets to not be visible and cause more of an illusion in my project. Once the magnets were installed, I covered the head with felt, glued the googly eyes, and created the antennas with pipe cleaners and pom poms.

From there I began the work on the body (the larger styrofoam ball); I cut the ball in half and dug out a portion of each half so that I would have a place to put my arduino board and additional electronics. I then covered each half with felt to create the well- known pattern of a bee's fur. I then went on to work on the wings. I cut out each wing from my styrofoam board, and then covered each in white felt to create a more professional look. I then installed the hinge and lock system onto the halves of the larger styrofoam ball and was able to reconnect the pieces together to make one coherent piece.

I then took more black pipe cleaners and glued them to the bottom half to create the legs of the bee; in future iterations I would love to create stronger legs so that the bee would be able to stand on its own. I measured some felt around my touch sensor for the stinger and glued together a piece of felt that my touch sensor could slip in and out of; I attached the stinger in between the cracks of the top portion of the body and the body portion of the body.

Finally, I just had to attach the wings and the head. I attached the wings in an upright position using hot glue as my aid to make sure they would stay. Once my wings were secured, I moved on to attaching the head. Due to the weight of the head, I had to use additional wire that I impaled through the head and the body to create a stronger connection between the head and the body. From there I used hot glue to finalize the connections and ensure that the head would stay. I then loaded my electronics into the body and hot glued my vibration motors to the inside to make sure the user could feel the strongest vibration possible. I used a 9 volt battery for the bee and included a switch that could be easily accessed by opening up the bee.

Overall, I am really pleased with the end result. I was able to make both pieces of my project mobile which is a huge feat for me. Before I took my Object class, I knew very little about circuits, arduino, or physical computing in general, so being able to build a project like this on my own really shows the amount of information I learned in the course and then was able to apply within my own life. I really hope I am able o use these new skills in my senior year of college and produce an excellent and interactive senior project! I would also love to have future iterations where I make the bee legs stronger to support the body and potentially make a game out of the interaction. This project and class in general has me thinking much more about the way the physical world can interactive with the technical world. I really enjoy children and hope to make more interactive projects in the future that are geared towards children and education. I really had fun creating this interaction of the natural world and making a simple way for kids to understand the concept of pollination and how bees exist.