Camosun College technology students put on an impressive display on Thursday with new tech inventions and innovations that provide solutions for a number of real-life needs or problems.
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Graduating Electronics and Computer Engineering Technology students at Camosun College featured their designs at a year-end Capstone Symposium at Camosun’s Interurban Campus on Dec. 12.
“These tech projects are truly amazing,” Alan Duncan, Electronics and Computer Engineering Technology chair with Camosun College, said. “Our students gain valuable, applied career experience, creating solutions to real problems.”
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| Students Owen Moss (left), Zach Brinton (right), and Matthew Lotocky (center) demonstrate how their amplifier can play music from a phone and an electric guitar at the same time. (Sophie Heizer/News Staff) |
One such problem identified by students Cole Gamborski, Cam Phillips, and Simon Fowler is deer and other pests coming into people’s back yards and damaging property, green space, or harming pets. Phillips said the group wanted to come up with a humane but effective method of deterring wild animals from entering back yards, and they used artificial intelligence (AI) to do it.
Their product is called Buck Be Gone, but it has the ability to identify seven different species: deer, raccoon, cat, dog, human, tractor, and tree. This means the system knows whether a raccoon has snuck into your backyard or if it was just the neighbor’s cat. If a pest is identified, the system emits a tone signal above or below the audible range for humans, cats, and dogs that will ring uncomfortably in the pests’ ears.
A second project addresses being able to map out, measure and evaluate a physical space in a virtual environment. Students Andrew Orme, Nicholas Gee, Alex Gowans, and Duncan Stannard have created a device that uses a consumer-grade laser to map out a room and translate that map into 3D data on a computer so the design can be viewed virtually.
This cloud point mapping technology is often used in computer-assisted design for architecture or construction. The creators said this technology would allow users to produce a 3D map at an affordable price.
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| Connor Barclay (foreground, grey shirt) and Sean Jeffery (background, white shirt) demonstrate how their digital synthesizer creates sound at the touch of a button. (Sophie Heizer/News Staff) |
Other innovative projects include a battery monitor, which allows users to monitor lithium battery power in remotely controlled vehicles, a digital synthesizer designed for musicians or DJs, a Bluetooth data transmitter to replace cables used to measure environmental data, a high-watt audio amplifier that allows the user to play guitar music and external audio at the same time, and a “cricket” long-range location tracker that allows search and rescue teams to pinpoint the devices last known location.
Graduates of Camosun’s electronics and computer engineering technology program can choose to work with local companies, or chose to enter Camosun’s engineering bridge program that transfers to the University of Victoria.
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