Paragon Project: Kevin McAleer’s Googley Googley Eyes
I’m very excited to feature one of Kevin McAleer’s many brilliant project for our Paragon Project series – namely, Kevin’s Googley Googley Eyes.
They’re googly eyes that can tell you what they see!
If you don’t know Kevin’s work, you can check out his website here and his very popular YouTube channel here.
The project actually relies on OpenAI rather than Google, but the idea is effectively the same. By using an in-built camera, the googly eyes can detect, recognize, and announce the items they come across.
Hardware
So, for this project, Kevin has collected a Raspberry Pi Zero 2W, a Raspberry Pi camera, a Pimoroni Inventor HAT mini, some motors, and a speaker.
Additionally, he has created four 3D-printed files (for the holder, the mount, and the eyes) and you can find the .stl files over at the project page here.
Once the Pimoroni Inventor HAT mini is attached to the Pi Zero 2W, the motors have to be hooked up to the HAT. You’ve also got to attach the camera to the Pi Zero 2W and screw it in to the mount.
Once you’ve go that set up, then you just need to ensure that the speaker is attached to the Pimoroni Inventor HAT mini.
Software
The first thing you’ll need is to install Raspberry Pi OS. After which, you need to download the project code. And, as he always does, Kevin has kindly provided the code on GitHub.
You’ll also need to set up an account on OpenAI and get an API key so that your Googley Googley Eyes will be able to talk to OpenAI.
Once you’ve done that, you’ll be able to also tell OpenAI how to describe the object that its directed towards. Kevin suggests, for instance, that it be “nonchalant and snarky”.
In order to make the eyes move, you’ll need to check out the library for the Pimoroni Inventor HAT mini, which is available here.
So the idea is that the camera detects an object and then uses OpenAI to recognize it. Once that is complete, the speaker uses text-to-speech to tell you what it sees.
Finally, you can have ChatGPT tell you all about that weird bronze statue thing that your granddad gave you. No need to ask reddit anymore.
Conclusion
There you have it folks, Kevin McAleer’s googly eyed robot that will transform your life.
If you want to get your hands on the code, you can check it out over to Kevin’s website. Kevin has also made a video showing how to make them and the Googley Googley Eyes in action.
You can see more Paragon Projects that we’ve featured in this series by clicking here.
How would you like to see this project develop?