Another Blade Runner thread: The Portable Voight-Kampff Scanner

PhillipD said:
Here is the meaning of the old ID's:

View attachment 771977
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That's very cool regarding the old IDs! Exactly the kind of thing I'm looking for, though I think they do deviate from that in more instances than noted in that image.

I spent time designing the UI functions last night, and I'll post more about it when I'm next in front of my home PC, but I'm working on basically making things randomized and procedural; the DNA readouts, data points, and other shown data will basically never be the same twice. I need to come up with a table of [FIRSTNAME] [LASTNAME] strings for replicant names, as well as a table for possible [CAREERS] - i.e. Engineer is one I saw displayed a few times at that SDCC Blade Runner 2049 readout. I'm open to suggestions for inclusion. ;)

tmax said:
Thanks @Kylash for the better pic. So maybe a shot size like this...

View attachment 771974

(Forgive the crudeness of this design, I did it in Mac Preview! Lol. And I'm no designer.)

Also note, when you zoom in on that pic, the ID appears to also be "branded" to the inside of the lower eyelid.
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I like this a lot. I've got a good chunk of the UI functions done at the moment and I think I have memory to spare, so I'm debating doing a two-step analysis on the display, where it shows the full eye, then picks a quadrant (designated as "safe" in the eye data image arrays, i.e. a region specific to that image's lower sclera) and zooms in (in a very clunky, somewhat stutter fashion, because of the limitations of the Arduino) to the kind of shot you're showing here, then prints the readout. Might be overly ambitious, but I'm keeping my options open - I want this to be an awesome show.
 
This is shaping up to be a really awesome piece! I stumbled across this interesting article over on Propsummit: https://www.creativereview.co.uk/bladerunner-2049-back-world/

This quote has me wondering if it could be incorperated into your design.
For example, K’s Spinner technology reflects his low status as a second class citizen – his Spinner is old and worn, dilapidated and recycled, the technology glitch and ghosty, with screen burn and colour fade (shown above).
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I have a suspicion that there might be a limit in the software but possibly something to consider.
 
BR12819 said:
This is shaping up to be a really awesome piece! I stumbled across this interesting article over on Propsummit: https://www.creativereview.co.uk/bladerunner-2049-back-world/

This quote has me wondering if it could be incorperated into your design.

I have a suspicion that there might be a limit in the software but possibly something to consider.
Click to expand...

I would love to have graphical glitches, static, noise in the background, ghosting text, all of that. I can photoshop that stuff up in my sleep, but you are correct that the limitations are software-based.

I've been using Adafruit stuff on my projects, specifically the Trinket and Pro Trinket, because they are tiny and versatile packages that are also quite cheap. I'm pushing the Pro Trinket pretty much to the edge of what it can handle with everything I'm envisioning in this project right now. I'm actually quite proud of myself for that, because I have been hard-coding a UI and necessary routines with memory optimization in mind and I've barely used half my allotted space.

I have become aware of an Arduino variant in the last few days called the Teensy that has me thinking. It has way more RAM as compared to the Trinket (64K versus 2K!), way more flash memory (256K versus 28K), a beefier chipset that can run at a clock speed of 72-96 MHz (versus the Trinket Pro's 12-16MHz) and also fits in a very small footprint. It would be able to drive data a lot faster to the screen, do double-buffering and animations, and probably store full color images.

This is not without some downsides, though:

  • It's more than double the cost of the Pro Trinket (~$10 versus ~$20);
  • It lacks some of the safety features the Pro Trinket has, and therefore is vulnerable to irreparable damage if power or pins are mishandled;
  • Utilizing all those features requires an order of magnitude more programming on my end to get something stable and working.

I ordered one to play around with. Even if I don't use it for this particular project, I can guarantee I'll find those features useful for something else in future. If I were thinking of making just the one scanner for myself, I'd absolutely be using this chip. I could build this into the baseline specs for this device, but it'll end up increasing the price of a possible run accordingly, so it's not something I want to do without a lot of careful consideration.
 
I don't know if you've seen this or not, but I figured I'd share anyway just in case. It's an article about the technology in 2049: https://www.engadget.com/2017/10/20/designing-the-technology-of-blade-runner-2049/

Here are some photos in it that I thought were the most related to what you're going for. Hope this helps!
MemoryLab_v0001.jpgdims-2.jpegdims.jpeg
 
Ein said:
That's very cool regarding the old IDs! Exactly the kind of thing I'm looking for, though I think they do deviate from that in more instances than noted in that image.
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The Picture is from Blade Runner Future Noir. Unfortunatly I don't own the book yet. It's very cheap though. Available on amazon.
 
So, any more movement on the body design and fabrication? It was going along pretty well there for a while.
It needed some more tweaking but looked to be ready for printing. :)

Post updated pic's when you can.

.
 
Great work so far, i'm really learning a lot following this thread.

Here's a pie in the sky thought to take it to the next (perhaps gruesome) level !

Could the LED on the scanner put out "black light" ? You could have an eyeball prop in a plastic bag (complete with optic nerve and muscles). The serial number could be painted on the eyeball with "invisible ink" which scanned would glow the serial number of the replicant on the sclera.

This probably shows more about my lack of prop crafting understanding than anything else but I think it would be a cool effect.
 
propmaster2000 said:
So, any more movement on the body design and fabrication? It was going along pretty well there for a while.
It needed some more tweaking but looked to be ready for printing. :)

Post updated pic's when you can.

.
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My printer is currently tied up doing some other commission work, so I can't spit out prototypes at the moment anyway. Figured doing the electronics would be a good way to handle the interim time.

GasmanR said:
Great work so far, i'm really learning a lot following this thread.

Here's a pie in the sky thought to take it to the next (perhaps gruesome) level !

Could the LED on the scanner put out "black light" ? You could have an eyeball prop in a plastic bag (complete with optic nerve and muscles). The serial number could be painted on the eyeball with "invisible ink" which scanned would glow the serial number of the replicant on the sclera.

This probably shows more about my lack of prop crafting understanding than anything else but I think it would be a cool effect.
Click to expand...

I'd be lying if I said I didn't spend a little time thinking about an eyeball with a serial number on it after seeing that shot of Morton's digits on his sclera.

There are UV LEDs, but the thing about this idea is that, as far as I understand, it's dangerous? UV is one of those eye safety concerns, and the harmful wavelengths aren't even the ones you can see to identify. Probably have to do a lot of research before I'd be anywhere near comfortable with the idea. I'm sure a single, ~405nm UV LED wouldn't do much, but some of those suckers can be near-laser intensity.
 
[/QUOTE]There are UV LEDs, but the thing about this idea is that, as far as I understand, it's dangerous? UV is one of those eye safety concerns, and the harmful wavelengths aren't even the ones you can see to identify. Probably have to do a lot of research before I'd be anywhere near comfortable with the idea. I'm sure a single, ~405nm UV LED wouldn't do much, but some of those suckers can be near-laser intensity.[/QUOTE]

I'm in agreement with you there - a high powered UV LED is probably a bad idea. But my understanding that "Black Light" while still being UV is closer to visible light (UV A as opposed to UV B) so is not such a risk. Hence all the glow in the dark bowling alleys, indoor putting golf courses and discos. Perhaps somone in the know can enlighten us more fully.
 
Ein said:
This can be done with the same 3 byte arrays as the initial image, but actually has a lot more fidelity to me and reads cleaner as an "eye" without looking like it's being rendered by a Commodore 64. To wit:

https://i.imgur.com/6tA6znZ.png
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I see you incorporated my suggestion on the Replicant's "specs", I'm honored! :$. I think the screen you have here is pretty much on the dot, maybe another 2 cents: in the first 20 minutes of the film, you see K scanning the eye in his spinner and Morton's identity comes from a batch of serial numbers, so that could be the data to fill your "blank square" right below the LAPD label: a bank of replicant seril numbers, others have already mentioned the protocol that dictates the shape they have: (date, sex, physical data, etc) so you could have a huge block of possible replicants, sort of like the "catalog" of missing subjects that must be retired. I could even be animated to show a scrolling list. I read what you mentioned about the new and improved chip, I would be willing to go for an improved chip even if it costs a bit more, in the end the experience would be that much more powerful. I like to read about the "method to your madness", it's always interesting to read about investigative work, and problem solving. Good work man!!!
 
I'll post more on this tomorrow, but here's where we're at for now. Brief start screen following white LED flash (appears for ~half a second):



The scan screen.



Currently randomly picks if the target is replicant or human, then picks a gender, then based on that gender creates a target name (from a list of male or female first names and common last name pool). It then assigns two random fingerprints (from a pool of 5 graphics at the moment, though it will flip them at random, giving me 10 'unique' prints to pull from) and draws them in the upper left. Generates a series of random rectangular 'blips' for the right side and colors them, and from that pool will pick 2 unique ones on two separate rows to highlight red, then starts drawing analysis lines onto the eye graphic (needs a bit more work, I have to have them adjust to random points on the target). The DNA graphic is the same every draw at the moment, but the "GCAT" lines below it are also randomly generated patterns.

A few more examples.





I'm at about 70% of my memory limit with what you're seeing on a Pro Trinket. That is very hard-won, and I have been trying to be hyper-efficient about how I compartmentalize everything into separate functions. I also have been prioritizing minimal RAM calculations on the Trinket, as it only has 2KB, so things like Strings become a bit daunting. I'd like to play around with the Teensy 3.2 to see if it opens up more opportunities for me... still, for now, I'm feeling like this is looking pretty cool.
 
Very impressive.

I really like the glow effect from the sides you were able to achieve. The boot screen looks very good!

Do you have plans for the empty rectangle on left side?
 
Borax said:
Do you have plans for the empty rectangle on left side?
Click to expand...

Still brainstorming. I'm thinking I might drop the top line (above the "Name" field), move some of that information into there, and add more identifying text in the summary field at the bottom. Maybe?

Open to suggestions.
 
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