A Glowing Equinox Clock for Your Desktop

As David Hunt (AKA “BlackberryJamMan") puts it in his project write-up, “The human mind has been fascinated by devices that keep track of time for thousands of years.” He also notes that, “A wide range of ingenious methods have been employed by different cultures” for this purpose. Now, however, with the advent of quartz timekeeping, cell phones, and the Network Time Protocol (NTP), getting an accurate time reading is somewhat trivial.

Nonetheless, figuring out new and unusual ways to display time remains an innovative pastime, perhaps because it’s a great way combine technology and artistic expression into something that’s actually useful. Hunt’s timepiece, the “Desktop Equinox Clock,” was inspired by Bram Knaapen's Equinox Clock, and takes the form of a series of 60 WS2812 LEDs arranged in a circular pattern. Timekeeping and processing is handled by a Wemos D1 mini board, which has both the computing power needed to control the LEDs, and WiFi capabilities to check the time using NTP.

The clock displays time with a green light as a second "hand," blue to indicate minutes, and red for hours. A light show happens at each quarter hour division of the clock, and a light “chime” is used to reinforce the minute hand position. While there are no controls onboard, as long as it can find WiFi that clock should simply work, and it’s even programmed to account for British Summer Time.