Colorful Clock

Here is a clock with an RGB LED display that can show time with different colors, depending on your energy level.

In our design, the time will be shown with green color in the morning which shows you are full of energy. As time passes, the color will gradually turns to red at night which shows you lack energy and need to have a good rest. 

In addition, the Colorful LED can also monitor your actions. If you come close, the colorful clock will say hello to you, and if you go away from it, the colorful clock will say bye to you. 

Prep

To make the colorful clock, we the following components：

Warning: embedding parts within the project story has been deprecated. To edit, remove or add more parts, go to the "Hardware" tab. To remove this list from the story, click on it to trigger the context menu, then click the trash can button (this won't delete it from the "Hardware" tab).
	Arduino UNO I used Seeed Studio's version, the Seeeduino			Buy from Newark Buy from store.arduino.cc Buy from Adafruit Buy from Arduino Store Buy from CPC
	RGB LED Matrix
	Grove RTC
	Grove Ultrasonic Ranger
	Grove Sliding Potentiometer

• Arduino MainBoard is used for controlling
  
• The RGB LED Matrix is used for showing the time
  
• The RTC gets the current time 
  
• The sliding potentiometer can be used to control the brightness of LED Matrix. 
  
• The Ultrasonic Ranger is used to check whether there is someone around, thus showing something special on LED Matrix. 
  

You can choose other modules to achieve this such as PIR Motion Sensor. If you want more Interaction with the clock, you can also add buttons or a joystick. 

Assembly

If you are familiar with Arduino, it will be very easy to connect these modules together.

1. RGB LED Matrix

The RGB LED Matrix consists of WS2812B RGB LED. There are four pins for connection:

• +5V - 5V power supply
• DIN - Input the control signal
• GND - Ground
• DOUT - Output the control signal, and connect to next panel's DIN

We only need the +5V/GND/DIN pin, you can connect the DIN pin to any digital Pin on Arduino. In my case, I chose the D5 pin.

2. RTC

I chose the Seeed's Grove - RTC, which is based on the clock chip DS1307 and support I2C protocol. Connect it directly to the I2C interface of Arduino.

3. Sliding Potentiometer

Connect the Sliding potentiometer to ADC pin of Arduino, A0 for example. When you slide the potentiometer, the output voltage will change with your operation.

4. Ultrasonic Ranger

The Ultrasonic Ranger is a non-contact distance measurement module. It is controlled by single pin.

Download Software 

All the software has been uploaded to the gitHub, you can download it from here, put the library to the library path of your Arduino IDE (e.g. D:\Arduino\libraries) and then open the ColorfulClock.ino file, connect the Arduino to your computer and compile (maybe you need to modify the code due to the connection of modules) and upload.

Test & Play

To test the Colorful Clock, place your LED Matrix where you want it, at the corner of your table for example, and fix the ultrasonic ranger. You can even make a custom enclosure for your Arduino if you like.