Ken Burns and his team at TinyCircuits successfully ran a Kickstarter campaign in 2012 for their TinyDuino platform. After several maker projects involving LEDs the team decided to try some OLED projects. Seeing prototypes of the first OLED screens the look and feel of the display was inspiring - they decided that the technology would allow people to create great new maker devices, like smart watches or glasses.
TinyScreen not only gives users a great display screen for their project, but the infrastructure exists that the users can build almost anything with it. With the existing TinyDuino kits you can pick and choose components to stack together like little electronic Legos.
Codebender is the team's programming partner and several applications already exist for users to use. The Kickstarter campaign video shows smart glasses, a smart watch, jewelry, a server load display, and a tiny video game console. Many of these applications work without any programming, just downloading the code and assembling the device.
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/kenburns/tinyscreen-a-color-display-the-size-of-your-thumb
The smart watch is the most developed TinyScreen project. An open source app already exists, compatible with iPhone and Android, that gives the user options for what will be displayed on the watch.
Phone calls, texts and tweets can be displayed. Files are available to download and print 3d enclosures for the watch, and the company also plans to sell their own enclosures in the future.
TinyScreen is amazing and the project has already more than doubled its funding goal in the first week of the campaign. The money is set to purchase the first round of OLED screens.
The first project in 2012 allowed the team to learn several lessons about manufacturing, quality control and assembly. Making a large variety of low volume products means that in-house manufacturing makes the most sense.
Seeing a company build on their previous success with Kickstarter to move their projects to another level is great. This incremental innovation is inspiring, and the company plans to continue to develop more tools for the Internet of Things.
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/kenburns/tinyscreen-a-color-display-the-size-of-your-thumb