Lizard. Lizard. Lizard Lizard Lizard.
Inspired by the post-credits scene in Pixar’s Elio, Glen Akins built this single-button soundboard that just plays “lizard” over and over.
Over the summer, Pixar released its latest film: Elio. By Pixar standards, the audience and critical reception have been pretty mediocre. But the theatrical release did contain a post-credit scene that is popular on social media. That scene shows a lizard pressing the button for a lizard emoji on a smartphone. Over and over and over, with the phone announcing “lizard” each time. It should be annoying, but it is somehow charming — probably because the lizard has such a happy expression on its face. Glen Akins wanted to feel that joy for himself, so he built this single-purpose soundboard.
A typical soundboard contains a whole array of buttons to trigger the playback of pre-recorded sound samples, which is useful for podcasters and radio hosts that need to reuse audio clips on a regular basis. This works like that, except it only has a single button and one sound sample: “lizard.” By pressing the button repeatedly, Akins can live the experience of the lizard from Elio. We’re sure that everyone around Akins appreciates that, too.
This is a really straightforward build that only requires a handful of components. The first is an Adafruit QT Py RP2040 development board, which is very small. The second is an Adafruit Audio BFF, which is an audio board that matches the size of the QT Py. It has a microSD card slot for audio samples, a built-in DAC, and an amplifier. The two boards connect together through header pins for easy assembly. The only other electronic components are a big button and a small speaker.
Those fit into a simple 3D-printed enclosure with a speaker grill and the button placed prominently on top, where it is easy to access in emergency scenarios.
The code, programmed in CircuitPython, is also very simple. It just waits for a button press and then triggers the playback of a random audio file on the microSD card. When the only audio file present is “lizard,” that is all that will play. But one could add more samples if that becomes a little too monotonous. With some button debouncing and the ability to start the playback of a new sample before the current sample finishes, Akins was done with the programming.
We suggest using the project files provided by Akins to build one of these for a niece or nephew. Their parents are sure to thank you!