Pixel Pea-s de Résistance
The Pixel Pea is an easy-to-build, single-component digital frame you can use to show off your pixel art.
It is hard to say exactly why it is the case, but for one reason or another, everything looks better when it's pixelated. Who needs a 48 megapixel image when you can have that classic 8-bit look instead? The pleasing aesthetics of pixel art have led many hobbyists to build picture frames and other gadgets to show it off in their homes.
The latest example of such a device comes from Redditor fabpub. It is a digital picture frame called Pixel Pea, and aside from being beautiful, it is also super easy to build. In fact, it only requires a single component — a Waveshare ESP32-P4-WIFI6-Touch-LCD-4B. OK, so calling it a “single component” may be cheating a bit, because this device is equipped with a dual-core ESP32-P4, an ESP32-C6 for Wi-Fi 6/BLE, 32MB of external PSRAM, 32MB of NOR flash, a 4-inch square 720×720 IPS display, and lots more. But all you have to do is pull it out of the box.
fabpub has developed firmware for the display that connects to Wi-Fi to grab new pixel artwork as needed to keep things fresh. The image it displays is swapped out every 30 seconds, or you can tap on the screen to cycle through the options. For more control, a web interface has also been developed.
I’d call this an easy weekend project, but if you already have the hardware it won’t even take that long. The full source code is available at GitHub, and you could have it up and running in under an hour with the help of the instructions provided by fabpub. Or, if you would prefer something more authentically vintage, you can make this Atari 2600 digital photo frame.