I made this portable DIY instant camera from one of your
thermal printer. I use the Ada programming language to control an OpenMV
camera module that takes pictures and send them to the printer.
There are moments in life where you find yourself with an AdaFruit thermal printer in one hand, and an OpenMV camera in the other. You bought the former years ago, knowing that you would do something cool with it, and you are playing with the latter in the context of a Hackaday Prize project. When that moment comes — and you know it will come — it’s time to make a DIY instant camera. For me it was at the end of a warm Parisian summer day. The idea kept me awake until 5am, putting the pieces together in my head, designing an enclosure that would look like a camera. Here’s the result:
The Hardware On the hardware side, there’s nothing too fancy. I use a 2 cell LiPo battery from my drone. It powers the thermal printer and a 5V regulator. The regulator powers the OpenMV module and the LCD screen. There’s a push button for the trigger and a slide switch for the mode selection, both are directly plugged in the OpenMV IOs. The thermal printer is connected via UART, while the LCD screen uses SPI. Simple.
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