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Big Fucking "Covid" Badge

Another Big Fucking Badge. Now even bigger and pandemic-inspired

hexum064hexum064
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This board is simpler than the DC 27 BFB we built but it is bigger! Just a Conway's Game-Of-Life sim with some good hackability. Of course the shape is a coronavirus and we admit that having it run the game of life might be a bit on the nose.

We were not sure if there was going to be an In-Person version of DEFCON this year so we had nothing prepared. This badge was literally started in early June! Talk about rushing things.

This time the badge is simpler, with no sound, no RGB LEDs (just white), and no capacitive touch buttons (just regular tactile ones). On the bright side (pun intended), it does have 1024 white LEDs. 

Why so many? Well the irony of this Coronavirus-shaped badge is that it plays Conway's Game-of-Life.

The buttons are there to let you adjust different things, such as game params, speed, and global LED brightness. There is also a mode for editing the starting patterns (did I mention there are 8 patterns, a few preprogrammed, a few blank?).

Had to remove the feature of being able to interconnect the badges. Just not enough time to work out the detains. But at least we made this one bigger than the DC27 badge (yep bigger. It's over 12"x"12")

Plan is to start with a run of 20. Fingers crossed that everything goes ok (and that we did the circuit design correctly), and that I can get the coding wrapped up.

  • Down to the wire

    hexum064 • 08/05/2021 at 18:07 • 0 comments

    Boards arrived on the 4th. My buddy is driving them to Vegas on the 5th.

    And we spend the evening finishing up the boards (not all the components were available to AllPCB to assembly for us so we had to do some soldering). Also has to remove the boards from their "frames". Kept one in the frame, #20 of 20, in case someone wanted it.

    Everything went pretty well, EXCEPT...

    Somehow ended up with red LEDs instead of white, which looks more sinister, but harder to read and not as bright for the same amount of current (had to bump up the constant current setting in the code, meaning shorter battery life :<  ). Bummer. But at least they work.

    Instructions for how to use/play with the badge coming next.

  • Code Done.

    hexum064 • 07/27/2021 at 22:42 • 0 comments

    Well. Code is done. Ugly, poorly organized, and rushed as usual.

    Here's a link to the repo that has pretty much everything:

    https://github.com/Hexum064/Big-Fucking-Covid-Badge

  • Nyan Cat

    hexum064 • 07/23/2021 at 00:10 • 0 comments

    It has to have a Nyan Cat mode.

  • Big leaps forward

    hexum064 • 07/21/2021 at 19:09 • 0 comments

    The initial run of the board came back. Looks fantastic.

    Had no luck finding any help placing the 1050 components, and having it done by a pick-and-place company was going to cost a ton and take way to long. So 4 hours and a sore back later and all parts were placed.

    The good news: everything worked! When does it ever go right the first time !?!?

    So the actual boards, and the assembly are under way (with ALLPCB this time). They gave me the best turn-around time and price and most complete BoM fulfillment.

    Fingers crossed I get the board back in time now.

    Here it is running some prelim game-of-life code.

  • Oh ya! Chip Shortage...

    hexum064 • 07/03/2021 at 07:00 • 0 comments

    Well FUCK that was a close one.

    I was originally using the xmega32e5. Then I remembered the chip shortage.

    Sure enough, almost impossible to find (real ones anyway). Same with the SVR I was planning to use.

    Got lucky and had a bunch of attiny814s on had (and of course they are not out of stock anywhere), and it was easy enough to switch the code over. Also found another switching regulator that fit the bill and was simple enough not to need a prototype of the circuit.

View all 5 project logs

  • 1
    Not so much build, but use -- instructions

    First things first. The badge has three modes: normal "Conway's game-of-life" mode, Nyan Cat mode, and menu mode.

    In the normal game mode or Nyan Cat mode, the up and down buttons will adjust the brightness and the left and right buttons will adjust the speed.

    In game mode, tapping the select button will cycle through the game patter slots. Tapping select in Nyan Cat mode does nothing. Nyan Cat don't care.

    - Note: there are 8 pattern slots and 4 pre-programmed patterns. More on this later.

    You can enter menu mode by holding the select button for more than 1 second.

    In menu mode, the left and right buttons cycle through the menu options and the up and down buttons change the values for the current menu option. Tapping the select button will save the changes and exit out of the menu (back to either game mode or Nyan Cat mode)

    The menu options include:

    • Game Speed: Changes how fast the game runs or Nyan Cat plays. Select a speed from 0 to 7
    • Light Level: Changes the brightness from 0 to 7
    • Badge Mode: Switch between Normal and Nyan Cat
    • Loop Mode: Repeat on Stall or Stop. If the badge detects that the game is not updating from one cycle to the next, it can restart the pattern in Repeat on Stall mode
    • Select Slot: Selects which pattern slot is loaded in normal game mode from slot 0 to 7
    • Edit Slot: Special menu which lets you edit a pattern from slot 0 through 7
      • More on this to follow


    Editing Slots:

    As mentioned above, there are 8 pattern slots and 4 preprogrammed slots. If none of the 8 patter slots have been edited, the preprogrammed patterns will be selected. Since there are only 4 preprogrammed patterns and 8 slots, when cycling through the slots preprogrammed pattern 0 matches up to slot 0 and 4, 1 matches to 1 and 5, 2 matches to 2 and 6, and 3 matches to 3 and 7.

    If you edit slot 0 or 4, you will start with the pattern from preprogrammed pattern 0. However, if you save your edit, that will be the pattern now used from that slot. For instance, if you edit slot 4, initially the patter you edit will be from preprogrammed 0, but when you save, you will be saving into slot 4, so that will be what is show when selecting slot 4.

    When editing a pattern a cursor will indicate the cell to be changed. The cursor is a cross with the center being the selected cell. Tapping the select button will toggle the cell on or off. When done editing the pattern, hold the select button for over 1 second to return to the menu. This menu will allow you to do the following:

    • Save: saves the changes to the pattern and returns to the selected mode (either game or Nyan Cat). Note the edited pattern may not be the currently selected pattern that the game is running.
    • Cancel: ignores the changes and returns to the selected mode, same as Save.
    • Back: returns to the editor to continue editing the pattern.
    • Reset: resets the pattern to the matching preprogrammed slot.

    One final function: Reset all.

    -Holding all of the directional buttons when powering on will clear all of the game slots and saved settings.

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