.Monday, July 20, 2009 ;
9:51 PM
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The world needs your light....
Meeting started at 2:30 p.m. at Ngee Ann Polytechnic, Centre of Innovation.
Today's meeting was mainly about discussion. After hearing the judges' comments that our projector needs to be more portable, we brainstormed on any ways we could make it smaller or easier to carry around without compromising on other qualities.
Currently, our laser projector looks big because of the optical table and the supporting metal frames. We discussed if we could do without the frames but they were needed to hold the projector in that position above the screen. Kiat Long suggested that the big frames could be made foldable to be kept at the side of the projector like the handle of an umbrella but Mr Lee disagreed because fixing a single hinge joint can cost a lot. He disagreed with us dismantling the setup and assembling it at the judging venue because we might make a mistake out of nervousness or stage fright.
Mr Lee strongly insists that we fix everything such that the bigger optical table would have a large square gap in the middle. The smaller optical table would carry the volumetric screen while the larger table carries the metal supporting frames. The smaller table can be pushed under the table and erected upwards for the image to be formed on the screen. The height of the screen relative to the ground will also be adjustable.
The Centre of Innovation also plans to purchase and machine the flimsy metal frames to be much thiiner and yet sturdier. kiat Long suggested bamboo poles, but that would look extremely unprofessional on a mechanics physics tool like a projector. Bamboo is also hollow and will weakness the overall support of the projector itself. We also discussed changing the values in the terms of the lens equation to reducethe distance and will aloow us to scale down the projector, but this would require a new DMD, Laser Source and lenses. In terms of price and effort needed to purchase these materials, it is not worth it.
We then went on to discuss our presentation. mr Lee helped us brainstorm certain questions like the judges may ask. Mr Lee thinks that there is nothing wrong in making the projector bulkier if it can display impressive 3D images during satellite communications or for wide-screen cinematics. This is more of an R&D Project than an Innovations one and it will not be possible to tell whether it will be a success or failure at such an early stage. Finally, Mr Lee expressed worries regarding the lack of time and funding and also regarding the programming software portion of our project. We attempted to learn about mathematical formulae such as Fourier's Plan to help with developing source codes, but were still rather unclear after that.
Meeting ended at 4:45 p.m.
.Monday, July 6, 2009 ;
12:21 AM
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The world needs your light....
Meeting started at 0900h at Centre of Innovation
Today, we did a test run of the newly designed projector. After reconnecting the power supply and the laser software, the projector could function properly. However, the image of the rotating head was rather blurred since we were not using a high quality laser and the distance between the laser and screen is large, so there is large energy loss. Also, the ceramic tile, is the screen is rather thick, thus there is a large distance for diffraction of light rays to take place.
Next, we increased the image distance, so as to magnify the image. This was done by moving the laser frame upwards by approximately 8 cm. However, we decided to change to a newer table so as not to compromise with the quality of our image. Also, we are removing one of the leg barriers of the optical table so as to open up a space to insert a smaller table carrying the screen.
To improve the quality of the image, we decided to rectify the source, such as to make one frame per degree; as such, we created 360 images for one complete 360 degrees rotation. These images will then be inputted into the Compact Vision System. With a quantization of images, there would be smoother transition of the displayed image and would thus be of a higher quality. After which, we modified the Labview source cdes further, creating one which could process and transfer the 360 head rotation images.
Meeting ended at 1230h
.Wednesday, July 1, 2009 ;
9:13 PM
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The world needs your light....
Meeting started at 2:15 p.m.. Our agenda for today is to practise and be sure of the transferring process.
1) Log in as Administrator Account
2) Go to National Instruments, Measurement and Automation Explorer
3) Click on remote devices and select CVS, then right click and select file transfer.
4) Delete all files in the remote directory and create a new folder with a suitable name,
5) Transfer all images into the folder in numerical sequence
6) Open up the project file with Labview, and ensure that the images are in the corresponding format (.bmp / . jpg ) as according to the source code and Labview programme
7) Next, after ensuring the source code's correct, go to Project's Tab and create a new project
8) Go to my Real-time applications, right click and select build all, then build again, deploy and finally run as startup.
9) Finally, reboot the Compact Vision System so that the image can be reloaded.
Meeting ended at 5:30 p.m.