Moving Bird Head

Hello World!

for my project I have done a moving bird head. After finishing this a friend of mine said it reminded her of a Skeksis ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skeksis ) from The Dark Crystal movie, so now I am calling him SkekZek XD. But ya here it is then.

• base bored (I found mine in my local Hobby Lobby)

• sculpy light weight clay for jewlery ( found in most craft stores)
• cardstock ( found in most craft stores)
• black feathers
• feather boa
• black paint
• 5x mounts and 1x small (single holed) mount.
• 1x 1/4 bolt
• 1x 1/4 nut
• 1x washer
• 1x washer lockers

Electronics

• Pan and Tilt Servos ( http://www.robotmesh.com/df05bb-tilt-pan-kit-5kg?... ) This is the kind I used but there are others available.
• 1 micro servo ( http://www.robotmesh.com/df05bb-tilt-pan-kit-5kg?... )
• DX5e ( http://www.redrockethobbies.com/Spektrum-DX5e-5-Ch... )
• perfboard
• receiver battery supply for 4 AAs
• arduino connection for nine Volt battery
• arduino Uno
• 2x Red LEDs
• 2x 270k resistors
• single gage wire

So you can chose to make any kind of head you want with just a few tweeks but I did a bird. I had a couple problems like the size I made it. But I started with a base made of light weight sculpy and then cut some card stock into a point and folded it over to wrap around the sculpy as the top of the beak.

for the bottom jaw/beak I made it smaller then the top and left room to fold the sides up then I taped 2 needles together and stuck them through both top and bottom jaws. so the bottom jaw has something to pivot on.

to make the paper more stable I used Modge Podge. about 3 layers worth.

okay so I went through a pile of scrap wood and didn't actually have any exact measurement for the mounts I used. It all depends on he base board and how big your head is. make sure there is room for your pan and tilt and micro servo for the mouth. Don't forget a place for the arduino and perfboard later.

Use 2 of the mounts to connect the two pieces (board and servo mount support). then put two more mounts to prop the pan and tilt on the wood. I then used a smaller servo mount so that theres support on the top of the pan servo.

I put the receiver for the Dx5e on the bottom of the wooden support. and next to it I put the AA battery pack supported between the wooden support and another servo mount.

as for the wood piece on the pan and tilt its there to connect to the head sculpt using the bolt and washers through the last servo mount.

heres a video of me practicing.

so before attaching the head to the mount I painted it and feathered because I didn't want to run the risk of getting something important painted or glued. I used Hot glue to attach just about everything.

after mounting the head onto the wood attached to the pan and tilt I connected the jaw to the servo. The jaw I glued the fishing wire in the position of open mouth tightly so when the servo pulls back slightly it takes the mouth with it to a closed position even though only slightly.

So originally I was going to make the eyes able to move but I made my head to small and it hindered that. so instead of re doing my whole head I just took small foam balls you can find in the garden section of most crafts stores and sliced them in half and put in LED's instead.

I used and arduino cause I had one but there are probably other ways to accomplish glowing eyes.

this is the simplist form of hook up for LEDs to arduino. (I used 270K resistors)

this is my code:

void setup() {

pinMode(13, OUTPUT); // set pin 13 as output

digitalWrite(13, HIGH); // set pin 13 as high or 1

pinMode(12, OUTPUT); // set pin 13 as output

digitalWrite(12, HIGH); // set pin 13 as high or 1 }

void loop() { // left empty }

//END

you can get this strait from the arduino sight tutorials.

I used single strand wire to connect everything cause its easier to insert directly into the arduino.

don't forget to move everything from bread board to perfboard.

and make sure the arduino and perfboard don't get in the way of the pan and tilts movements.

so to finish I covered the servos and wiring with a black cloth and then took a feather boa from a craft store and cut it in sections then glued a couple sections to the cloth to make the neck.

Ta-Da! now its done. unless you want to ad your own touch.

Heres some videos