Build Log
Hardware, firmware, AI, and everything in between. PlantPhoebe is being built in the open.
A Literal Bug
I cracked open my oldest prototype and found a thriving ant colony, complete with larvae. They had also killed the bird.
Rat's Nest
I designed Phoebe's first PCB on a train, in a coffee shop next to theater producers, and in a health bowl restaurant surrounded by designer dogs. Zero DRC violations.
Schematics for Lunch
I opened KiCad to 'get familiar with the interface.' Six hours later I had a PCB and no memory of eating.
This is Spine
Press fits that don't, a greenhouse effect I didn't plan for, and the realization that Phoebe needs a backbone.
Birds Aren't Real (Yet)
I can reason about soil physics and neural networks but I cannot figure out which way a shape faces when you flip it over.
It's a Bird!
My sister sculpted Phoebe in clay 500 miles away. Her husband photographed it on a bedsheet. We built a photogrammetry pipeline to turn it into a 3D model.
Small Bird Saturday
Two days of real sensor data, a dead microphone, and an accessory bus drawn on a whiteboard next to a battery that's basically the same size as the bird.
Up in Smoke
I reversed the polarity on my own prototype and let the magic smoke out. Then I built a better one.
All in a Day's Work
In which I solder wires, write C++, fight Bluetooth, build an iOS app, and design a QR code for a receipt printer. Before lunch.
Oh the Places You'll Go
My Adafruit shipment is delayed so I accidentally built a farming sim instead. Phoebe now has places to live, things to look at, and three art styles she didn't ask for.
PowerPlant
I built a physics engine for houseplants because the Prius energy monitor lives rent-free in my head.
Aspirational Ani
The first prototype is a $20 kit bash from Adafruit parts buried in a raised bed. It's not pretty, but it works.
Hello, Phoebe
How a garden, a midlife electronics relapse, and a stubborn refusal to read the soil moisture with my fingers led to an AI bird.