# Shooting Gallery ?



## David_AVD (Nov 9, 2012)

I've been watching some videos on YouTube by Restless Hollow. He made a cool shooting gallery for his haunt this year.

This is something I've wanted to do for a while as an arcade game, but incorporating it into the haunt seems like a great idea!

I'd probably go down the path of custom PCBs for the targets, prop control and master controller.

At present I'm looking at Namco light guns on eBay that could be fitted with new electronics. Arcade guns are virtually impossible to import into Australia so thought that may be the easiest way.


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## BillyVanpire (Apr 22, 2015)

neat idea, have you seen the gun mod video he made?


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## David_AVD (Nov 9, 2012)

Yes, I watched a lot of the October Shootout videos - the ones that seemed to pertain to the gallery at least. He put in a lot of effort on his haunt.

You can't buy anything that resembles a real gun in Australia, so the modified PlayStation or arcade guns will be the go for me.

I think his system only showed the number of shots left. It would be nice to show a score as well. That's a little more complicated when you have more than one gun shooting at the same set of targets, but is completely doable.


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## BillyVanpire (Apr 22, 2015)

what about these guys?

https://www.armouredheaven.com.au/shop/


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## mikkojay (Sep 15, 2014)

Here is a PC app that I created for target practicing with a laser cartridge installed in a real firearm:
http://northosoft.com/sharpspotter/HTML/index.html

I was originally going to sell the app, but I didn't urge to follow through on it so I ended up parking it on the web for folks to download free.
It uses a webcam to detect laser light pulses that fall within user defined zones. Each zone can be assigned a distinct sound file to play when a hit is detected.

It is conceptually quite different from the "usual" arrangement of a sensor on each target, but it could probably be hacked into a haunted shooting range app.
If anyone would be interested in going down that road, I'd be happy to share what info I have on how it works.

-Mike


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## David_AVD (Nov 9, 2012)

BillyVanpire said:


> what about these guys?
> 
> https://www.armouredheaven.com.au/shop/


Good find. I hadn't seen them before. A lot of their items say "out of stock" but there may be something to be found.


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## David_AVD (Nov 9, 2012)

mikkojay said:


> Here is a PC app that I created for target practicing with a laser cartridge installed in a real firearm:
> http://northosoft.com/sharpspotter/HTML/index.html


Very interesting software - looks well done. 

I'm guessing that it wouldn't be able to tell who took the shot though (multi-player)?


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## mikkojay (Sep 15, 2014)

Hey thanks- it was a labor of love for a good 3-4 months but then I switched obsessions like I always seem to do  
Yes I did try an experiment where I assigned a red laser to one player, and a green laser to another player. I was able to differentiate the color of the detected dot about 90% of the time, but I never could make it perfect. The detected colors would also get a little bit skewed if the color of the target area being struck was not completely neutral.

It was also a little finicky when it came to ambient lighting in the target area, but once you got the calibration tuned, it was pretty reliable. There are professional systems that use basically the same concept, but the high dollar ones use IR lasers and cameras.

-Mike


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## mikkojay (Sep 15, 2014)

Thinking on it more, it seems like laser tag technology might be a good starting point as far as the beam & detectors go.
I just did a little more surfing on the topic and found this site:
http://www.lasertagparts.com
They have a neat page dedicated to sensors here:
http://www.lasertagparts.com/mtsensors.htm
This video has some pretty impressive accuracy:





Fun stuff! I look forward to seeing how this thread evolves.
-Mike


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## David_AVD (Nov 9, 2012)

Mine would like be outdoors with (changing) ambient lighting so I don't think the camera idea would work. It's still way cool though. 

The laser tag game stuff will certainly give me some ideas.


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## mikkojay (Sep 15, 2014)

I have been browsing their forum for the last hour or so, and there are some hard-core DIY folks into this stuff:
http://lasertagparts.com/forum/index.php
They even talk about the theory behind lens combinations, beam collimation, best LED part numbers, etc...


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## David_AVD (Nov 9, 2012)

Achieving a small enough IR beam at the desired target distance does seem to be one of the main issues.


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## David_AVD (Nov 9, 2012)

A quick look on the Element 14 site revealed the Osram SFH4550 IR LED for less than $1.

It has a 6° beam spread (+/- 3°) so should be ok without a lens at the distance a shooting gallery would involve.

A quick check with an angle calculator shows that at 3m (10') away, the spot area would be approx 300mm (12").

EDIT: The Vishay VSLY5850 also looks good.


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## David_AVD (Nov 9, 2012)

I guess an Arduino Nano would be the way to go for the target controller boards. If I stick to through hole components anyone could build them.

The board would have connections for power, IR target (LED + receiver module) and one high current drive for a solenoid, motor, etc. It could also have a few pins to trigger another prop controller.

Would it be worth putting headers for one of those cheap mp3 player modules too? That way each prop can optionally have a sound effect through a local speaker.

What would also be nice is an optional RS485 network connection so that these target controllers can tell a central controller when hits are registered (and who it was) for scoring.


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## mikkojay (Sep 15, 2014)

Would just plain-old serial suffice as long as the distances are under 20 feet or so?
The reason I ask is because you could implement a small serial protocol that would allow the targets to be chained together in a loop.
Controller Tx -- > Target 1 Rx
Target 1 Tx --> Target 2 Rx
Target 2 Tx --> Target 3 Rx
...
Last Target Tx --> Controller Rx.

That way any target that has a message show up in the serial buffer could:
1) see if the message is for my specific target ID
2) do something if needed
3) pass it on via serial write

I was also curious to know if you planned on making the guns part of the controller feedback loop. It would be fun to let the controller know when a shot is made, then if a target strike is not reported within a tiny wait, play a random ricochet sound (else play the struck target's associated sound).

One last tidbit I was wondering about- I noticed that the IR LED's seem to come in 950nm and 850nm. Are the typical IR remote receivers compatible with both frequencies, or would it be advisable to stick with one freq or the other?

I don't want to hijack your thread, this just my wheels turning and can't help it!

Thanks, Mike


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## David_AVD (Nov 9, 2012)

I have done systems before where the data was chained in and out of each device. I did consider that, but one failed node or broken cable can bring it all down.

A polled system can be plenty fast enough. Missing nodes are handled via a timeout timer (a little longer than the expected response time).

Good idea about the gun telling the central controller when the shot is fired. It could optionally have it's own sound module for misses.

I will be doing some experimenting with the IR LEDs and receiver modules soon.

The PCB design for the target controller is almost done.


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## David_AVD (Nov 9, 2012)

mikkojay said:


> One last tidbit I was wondering about- I noticed that the IR LED's seem to come in 950nm and 850nm. Are the typical IR remote receivers compatible with both frequencies, or would it be advisable to stick with one freq or the other?


I just checked one of the IR receiver modules I was looking at and the sensitivity graph shows that at 850nm it will be down to 75% compared with the 950nm peak.

For the application I think that will be fine, as the narrower LED beam angle is more important to me than a super long range.


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## David_AVD (Nov 9, 2012)

OK, board design for the target controller is done. It is double sided,72mm (2.825") x 65mm (2.55") in size and uses all through hole components.

Some features / specs:


Arduino Nano micro module
JQ6500-16P audio module
DC input (2 pin)
High current output with back-EMF diode (2 pin)
Speaker output (2 pin)
Line level stereo output (3 pin)
IR sensor / LED connector (4 pin)
Expansion connector (A0, A1, D13) (4 pin)
RS485 comms connector (3 pin)
Trim pot (for audio volume or ??)
Jumpers (4) for options / addressing


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## djgra79 (Oct 11, 2015)

I have no idea what you're talking about, but I know this is going to be awesome/fun upon completion! 
So could this application see you shooting at Zombies, Walking Dead Style, or at Ghosts, Ghostbuster style? Are the targets moving or in a fixed location?


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## David_AVD (Nov 9, 2012)

I had only envisaged static targets, but I'm sure some of the enterprising mechanical people here would be able to do moving ones too.

If you mean targets that pop up, that could be done with an add-on board to coordinate the movement.


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