Fast Video Doorbell / Intercom on Raspberry Pi
Introduction: Fast Video Doorbell / Intercom on Raspberry Pi
Hello everyone! I came across some nice software to make a fast video / 2-way audio doorbell with a Raspberry Pi, and found a way to fit all the components in a small case. I will show you how to build it, including how to make push notifications work when you press the button.
See the following video for a quick demo.
The hardware build requires a bit of drilling and soldering. The software portion is pretty straightforward with no coding required (unless you want to customize the sample programs). But it does require a Mac and XCode. See the following video that documents all the steps.
Supplies
* Raspberry Pi 3
* MicroSD memory card
* Power supply
* Plastic case
* Video camera module
* Speaker with built-in amplifier
* 3-pin to female socket cable for speaker
* Mini USB microphone
* Button
* Jumper wires
* Seajei SDK
Step 1: Drill Holes in the Plastic Case and Paint
Grab the plastic case, and mark the spots where to drill some holes as per the diagram.
Then drill the three small holes for where the speaker will be, so the sound can come out. Next drill the bigger hole on top right to place the button. Check your button diameter to pick the proper drill size.
After drilling, the edges around the holes tend to have a bit of an edge, so just cut around holes with a box cutter to make it all flat.
You can leave your case transparent, or if you want to give it a paint job now is a good time. A primer paint for cars works well.
Step 2: Prepare and Attach Wires for Speaker and Button
Now let's prepare the speaker cables. They are really long and so they probably would be tricky to fit into the case. 98
So shorten them by cutting and soldering them back together, and fitting a heat shrink wrap, as show in the picture.
Next, strip some extra jumper wires and attach and solder them to the button.
Step 3: Attach Button, Speaker and Camera Module to Case Cover
At this point all the components are ready to be attached to the case cover. First install the button.
Then the speaker: attach its wires, remove the adhesive band, and press it in place.
And then attach the camera module, which clicks nicely into the special case fittings.
Step 4: Prepare and Solder Audio Out Wire
Now for audio out, cut and strip another jumper wire (male so it connects with female wire on speaker), and pull it through the hole near the audio.
And then solder it to the audio out pin from the 3.5 millimeter audio jack.
See the image of the back of the Pi with the red arrow to see the exact location of the pin.
Step 5: Connect All the Wires and Close the Case
Now is the time to push the Raspberry Pi into the base of the case and connect up all the wires.
See the diagram image of Raspberry Pi pin numbers. Connect speaker power to Pin #1. Speaker ground to #6. Button wires to pin #7 and #9.
And of course connect the white speaker wire to the wire we soldered to the back of the Pi.
Then close the case shut.
Step 6: Install a Fresh OS on Raspberry Pi
For your Raspberry Pi 3 (or 3+), download and unzip Raspbian Stretch.
Apparently you should not install the latest Raspberry Pi OS because the audio player has an issue. I would hope that at some point it will be resolved.
Download and install the Raspberry Pi Imager.
Connect and format your microSD card. Then launch the Raspberry Pi Imager.
Pick a custom OS to install, and navigate to the Raspbian Stretch file you had downloaded and unzipped.
Select your microSD card, and click on "WRITE".
When it's finished, plug the microSD card into your Raspberry Pi.
Connect a monitor with the HDMI cable, and connect a USB mouse and keyboard. Then power up the Raspberry Pi.
Step 7: Configure Pi to Connect to WiFi and Get the Camera to Work Properly
Once it's up and running, go though the initial dialogs and get connected to WiFi.
Then click on the Raspberry icon on the upper left, then "Preferences", then "Raspberry Pi Configuration".
Then click on "Interfaces". Enable camera. Click OK and accept to reboot.
To check the camera is working, open up a Console by clicking on the black console icon on the top left.
Type the following.
raspistill -o cam.jpg
Then open up File Manager by clicking on the yellow folder icon on the top left.
And double click on cam.jpg to check whether the image is correct. 996