# 2019 Shooting Gallery



## weezllane (Sep 22, 2010)

I'm finally pulling the trigger on building a shooting gallery for Halloween. The main design feature was it had to fit in my garage! Then I could work on it despite the weather and hopefully, have it debugged before rolling it out on Halloween (it literally sits on casters).

Overall, the build uses MANY Arduinos, relays, and MP3 modules.

I'll start off with some progress pictures and eventually I'll post a more detailed breakdown of each component.


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## David_AVD (Nov 9, 2012)

Looks good. A shooting gallery has been on my Halloween to-do list for a couple of years.


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## weezllane (Sep 22, 2010)

*In progress video*

https://www.dropbox.com/s/7q12a3usxwwhpfx/IMG_2686.m4v?dl=0


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## spar13 (Oct 11, 2019)

weezllane said:


> https://www.dropbox.com/s/7q12a3usxwwhpfx/IMG_2686.m4v?dl=0


Looks amazing, awesome job.


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## Batbuddy (Sep 3, 2014)

Holy cow! That is freakin' awesome! Where did you get the electronics or did you build it from scratch?


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## weezllane (Sep 22, 2010)

All that's left is some final decoration. Hopefully, we'll get lots of visitors this year.


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## RoxyBlue (Oct 6, 2008)

Kids are gonna love that:jol:


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## xredge (Aug 21, 2014)

That's cool


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## weezllane (Sep 22, 2010)

I promise to post more information, but for now here's the Arduino code for some of the props.

https://github.com/weezllane/repositorium


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## Greg G (Nov 4, 2012)

That is awesome. Bet the kids loved it.


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## BJS (Jun 28, 2015)

That is awesome. Thanks for sharing. How did it go Halloween Night? I bet it was crazy.


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## Batbuddy (Sep 3, 2014)

Awesome Thanks for sharing the code!


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## weezllane (Sep 22, 2010)

*How I did it...*

So, my initial concept for a shooting gallery was to use Nerf guns and a few Fright prop controllers. I went so far as to design targets that would trigger a prop controller and they worked fairly well. As much as I liked the 'tactile' quality of using a Nerf gun, ammo was going to be a major headache. Infrared was the right choice.

The second criteria was the gallery had to fit in my garage. Allowing me to work on it during the chilly nights AND more importantly, make sure it was fully operational before rolling it out on Halloween (it literally sits on casters). Pneumatics are great but can be temperamental.

Lastly, I didn't bother including any type of score keeper. Everyone really just enjoyed watching things move.

Starting with the gun:

I picked up a few different toy muskets, but this particular one worked best.










This is how I 'narrowed' the IR emitter beam. I've read that narrowing the IR beam can be achieved with lenses, but this worked just fine. It allowed the player to be slightly inaccurate with their shots.



























The trigger was an arcade switch mounted with quake-hold. I had to dremel out a little space for it.










The grounds for the switch and IR emitter were tied together. The grounds and two other leads were then attached to a 3.5mm stereo connector. This allowed me to use a springy stereo cable to connect the gun to the Arduino.

The wiring, code, and other info can be found here:

Repositorium

Some of the parts I used:
Arduino Uno
IR Emitter
Arcade switch
4 digit display
Serial MP3 module
12 V Audio amp
Speakers scavenged from Goodwill
Breadboard, resistors, and wire


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## weezllane (Sep 22, 2010)

*How I did it (cont.)*

Everything was mounted to the underside of a wood round from Lowes.










I had hoped to power all of this with a single supply, however, I was getting some feedback through the speakers. The problem went away when I used two separate power supplies - one for the Arduino and one for the amp.










The barrels I scored from a Spirit store last year. They're plastic and lightweight.

I made two, but only used one for Halloween. Good thing, too, as the first one broke during the night. I was able to quickly exchange it with my backup.


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## weezllane (Sep 22, 2010)

*How I did it (cont.)*

The targets:

Each target/prop had it's own Arduino system. Some props had sound, some didn't. Most props had a target. All them utilized at least one relay. The coffin used an 8 channel relay.

Parts used:
Arduino Nano
Serial MP3 module
5V single relay module
5V 8 channel relay module
IR receiver
Red LED
Breadboards, resistors and wires

Arduino code and some diagrams can be found here

The actual targets were hand painted and mounted wherever I felt looked best.










The center is a Red LED that would go out when activated. The IR receiver glued on the front is the actual working receiver. It wasn't pretty, but at night no one could even see them. (The other LED in the middle is another type of IR receiver that didn't have good detection range. They were unused in my final design).

Each prop had it's own unique animation. The simplest one, like the lantern would just go out for a few second when hit. The barrel guys would play a different audio each time they were triggered. Same for the monster in the box.










The lights in the pumpkins would flicker in different patterns each time they were triggered.

The coffin was the piece de resistance. For the first three shots, it would simply shake and make a growling sound. On the fourth shot, the lid opened revealing a disco party and lights. A happy result was people thought the disco part was random. I don't think most people picked up on the pattern.



















These lights were battery operated. I added a jumper wire that acted like a switch when connected to a relay.


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## weezllane (Sep 22, 2010)

*How I did it (final)*

All the Arduino nanos were powered by a 10 port USB hub.










Audio went to a mixer. I had a LOT of cables.










And finally, all the 12v devices (ie solenoids, motors, etc...) were powered by a panel mounted on the backside of the gallery.










I'll be happy to answer any questions. I look forward to seeing what others come up with.


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## Batbuddy (Sep 3, 2014)

WOW! all I can say is WOW! I really love what you have done here I am seriously going to have to give this a try!


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## Dreadmakr (Jun 20, 2018)

Very impressive
The planning, experimentation and final construction must have involved a lot of work.
Do you have any plans for future improvements and/or expansion?


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## kenkozpgh (Sep 5, 2011)

Great job.


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## FistJr (Nov 11, 2014)

Great job! Really loved it. Thank you for sharing your ideas and how you did it.

It is inspiring me to do something similar. I'm thinking of designing an IR "target" very much like yours, and then using the output signal from the target as a trigger signal for one of Mike's button bangers from www.buttonbanger.com. Essentially what you did yourself, but instead of programming each prop with code on the Arduinos like you did (and which I suck at), I'd take advantage of the button banger front-end graphical interface to handle the prop animations for me.

Again, great job! I think we'll see a lot more shooting galleries in the future as a result of your work...


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## weezllane (Sep 22, 2010)

I'm so bummed I won't be rolling out the gallery this year. I had so many new ideas I wanted to try out. I'm curious if anyone else started one for 2020?


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