Automated Etch A Sketch

When I found my childhood Etch A Sketch game at the bottom of a drawer, I remembered how hard it was to draw a perfect circle using only the two knobs (horizontal and vertical axes). I immediately wanted to automate it!

Drawing organic rounded shapes or photos on a physical Etch A Sketch is humanly impossible.

I connected stepper motors to each control knob and designed a 3D-printed chassis. By writing a Python script to process vector images, I calculated the shortest single-stroke path and generated CNC G-Code. An Arduino Uno running GRBL receives the G-Code and tells the motors exactly what path to sketch. Now, the Etch A Sketch can sketch perfect complex images automatically!

Processing single-stroke vector paths in Python and using Arduino Uno stepper controls.