Arduino Controlled Robotic Flower

This is a small project that started during a university art sculpture class. I wanted to replace a houseplace with an electronic plant that had a little personality and style. My idea was to use an Arduino to power a small object which resembled a houseplant, but reacted to movement with motion and lights. The object I made has a small sonar sensor on the front, which will detect when something is too close and close it’s petals and hide for a while. When the coast is clear, the flower will turn on happy blue lights and dance it’s petals around.

This project was also a great excuse to build programming, electronics, sculpting and troubleshooting skills.

I began the initial layout in some 3/4” ply, which I notched out with a bandsaw so each servo would fit in snug. In hindsight, I wish I had used plastic sheet just to fit better aesthetically, but wood is easy to work with and inexpensive. After notching I test fit all the servos and wires and filed down where necessary. Then I began working on the flower petals, which I cut from some unpopulated circuit boards.

After getting the general layout done I tested my sonar sensor and wrote a quick program to control the servos with the value from the sensor. Next, I made some circles out of acrylic which attached to the servos and held the flower petals then painted the base. I tried to keep my cables nice and tidy where I could, which I thought added to the overall look of the piece.

All that was left was adding the rest of the electronics and starting to write the code. This was definitely the longest portion of this project. I took some extra care in trying to program the servos to look natural and biological, and anthropomorphize the piece by adding the sonar sensor and some LEDs in a particular fashion.

It was definitely tricky getting all the components to fit nice ad neatly on the bottom of the base. I also tried to use just one power supply for this project, which added some complexity while building it but made the end product very simple to use. You simply plug it in, and turn it on. The breadboard power supply I had could output both 3.3v and 5v, which perfectly suited my needs. The EL panel and servos do draw a lot of current and I’m probably at the limit of this power supply.

Finally, here is a short video of the working project. I’ve noticed the high voltage AC the EL panel uses can interfere with the sonar sensor, but it only happens occasionally. Otherwise I will add a nice base to place it on and enjoy my new houseplant!