Cybox

A little over a year ago I was admiring the redbox and its lovely collection of movies, which it displays so beautifuly on a screen in any sort order you would like. As an avid collector of blu rays I thought to myself, "This would be cool to have for my 120 movie collection. I was pretty new to programming and did know anything about arduinos or machinery so I never thought this would become a reality. Over the past year I purchased several types of arduinos, rfid reader/writers/ and a buttload of solder. I learned the basics one step at a time until I finally could talk like a true "beginner" arduino nerd. The main goal was to build this machine. I put together several SQL databases to practice how they would be collected, tested the working of stepper motors and servos, and figured out that you aren't supposed to touch the red and the black side of the wire at the same time. Today is actually one of the more exciting days of my life, because almost all of my spare time at home has gone into trying to figure out exactly how to build this gosh for saken movie machine!

Upon purchasing a movie you push a button to find the movie and check it into the system. Once you use the rfid to place it into a certain spot in the array of movies it will guide itself to the closest open location. When you wan't to watch a movie you can either use the quick check out method where you simply press a button and scan the rfid in the moviebox. Or you can use the integrated app to sort by movie title, genre, actor or any other prefered type. Upon selection you will then press watch this and the movie will be dispenced checking it out for you.

I constructed a box I saw in my mind which would fit a good prototype. Then I complied a list of all materials I may need. WE used eprom to store data on the arduino so it would always have the locations of movies stored, even upon updating of software. I used a 200 step stepper motor to move the gears and a whole lot of mistakes I will take as learning experiences for the real deal.

The biggest challenge I ran into was cutting circles by hand. Apparently human error is a thing, which ended up hurting the rotation in the end. Also we had to create the movie holders by hand, instead of a nice machine that would do that work for us. I hadn't done wood work for about 10 years and was concerned about using a hand saw for the cutting, but that worked out nicely. Also I am insanely tired... but happy :)

I did not think that this idea was a reality. My brain kept telling me that it would be too hard and that it was too much for me to handle. I am not lying when I say I failed about 50 times preparing for today. It was a frustrating struggle to learn all of the thing nessesary but holy crap I made it work. I was going to do a simple personal website because I didn't think I was ready to commit to making it. However I changed my mind and could not be more excited. This machine that half works and is not fully put together is one of the coolest things I have EVER done personally. When I do go on and create the real thing with all the nuts and bolts and shiny lights and plexi glass covering the front with double or even triple spinning wheels, and my buddys come over to hang out. They will see the grandeur that started as a simple box I made for a hackathon and be in awe when i tell them "It was easy!" :)

I learned that wood is a pain. You cant put back what you took away, and what you take away should probably stay taken away. I learned that my brain unfortunatly is always telling you that some things are out of reach when really "A lot of small steps, will eventually take you far!". I learned that builders and creators and inventors are the most suportive people, and they really do help drive the fire to be innovative and create and learn more and more. This was really fun.

My Cybox ("Twohy's Movie Machine") is a plan I will continue to create with. This simple box with a few gears will be a beautiful piece of art in my home. I will make the application work directly with the machine and continue to improve it. I could not be happier with the result that WE came out with today, and am so excited to make machines do my cutting for me!!!!

Built With

• arduino
• eprom
• rfid
• tools
• vb