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Interactive Whiteboard

Project Summary

3M is a leader in innovative technologies and is seeking an affordable solution to make an intelligent whiteboard that can compete with SMART Boards and other related products. The primary goal of this project is to modify a 3M prototype to produce a more refined system that can be used intuitively by a user and has many of the same features used in smart technologies today. Some of these features include showing what was drawn on the whiteboard onto a virtual medium, the ability to save the digital screen of what was drawn on the whiteboard, and the ability to draw using a variety of colors on the digital medium.

Design Goal

Find a creative solution that provides basic application functions and is within the budgets of schools and small to mid-size businesses. This prototype will emphasize the intuitive design concept to provide an out of-the-box solution for consumers who likely have no engineering expertise but require a robust application to promote a collaborative environment.

Design Constraints

  • Cost: The entire system must not cost more than $1000 to manufacture per unit.
  • Intuitive Design: The prototype shall be easy to understand and all functions shall be understood by clear labeling (images or words).
  • Packaging: The product shall fit in the existing box used to package the writing surface material from 3M.
  • Installation: Assembly can be performed in 15 minutes or less without using unique tools.
Figure 1: The IR Frame mounted on a whiteboard to detect drawing or writing.

Figure 1: The IR Frame mounted on a whiteboard to detect drawing or writing.

Figure 2: The Raspberry Pi hardware used to read information from the IR Frame and send it to the User Interface (UI) using Bluetooth.

Figure 2: The Raspberry Pi hardware used to read information from the IR Frame and send it to the User Interface (UI) using Bluetooth.