Octopus Analog Photocell Brick OBPhotocell

What is a photocell?
Photocells are sensors that allow you to detect light. They are small, inexpensive, low-power, easy to use and don’t wear out. For that reason they often appear in toys, gadgets and appliances. They are often referred to as CdS cells (they are made of Cadmium-Sulfide), light-dependent resistors (LDR), and photoresistors.

Photocells are basically a resistor that changes its resistive value (in ohms Ω) depending on how much light is shining onto the squiggly face. They are very low cost, easy to get in many sizes and specifications, but are very innacurate. Each photocell sensor will act a little differently than the other, even if they are from the same batch. The variations can be really large, 50% or higher! For this reason, they shouldn’t be used to try to determine precise light levels in lux or millicandela. Instead, you can expect to only be able to determine basic light changes

For most light-sentsitive applications like “is it light or dark out”, “is there something in front of the sensor (that would block light)”, “is there something interrupting a laser beam” (break-beam sensors), or “which of multiple sensors has the most light hitting it”, photocells can be a good choice!

The Freaduino Sensor Shield is the perfect shield to connect this senor to Arduino. Or Freaduino UNO which we had pre-stray Octopus Brick interface.

Features

3P buckled wires connector
Easy to ‘plug and play
Able to achieve very interesting and an interactive work

Package List

Hardware Connection

Connect the module to P1 port on OCTOPUS:BIT.

Code

You can see the whole program from the link here: link
Or you can download it from the page below.

Result

When the mapped value of light is above 700, micro:bit will display a heart; when the value is under 700, it will display a rectangle.