My partner is a huge Harry Potter fan. So, naturally, I’ve been thinking of ways to bring a little bit of that Hogwarts magic into our home. My latest crazy idea? To build one of the iconic moving paintings from the movies.
The Vision: A Little Bit of Magic on Our Wall 🖼️
The goal is to have a painting that looks pretty normal at first glance, but then you notice the person in the portrait subtly moving, maybe even looking around the room. No simple video loop on a screen—I want this to feel genuinely magical and immersive.
Here’s the pile of tech and craft supplies I’ll be wrangling to make this happen:
- The Brains: A Raspberry Pi 5 will run the show.
- The Canvas: An old monitor I have lying around.
- The Magic: AI-generated video from a tool like Sora or Veo to create the looping portrait.
- The Disguise: A cool, old-fashioned picture frame, some paint to give it texture, and a sheet of acrylic plexiglass to make it look less like a screen.
My Game Plan: Tackling This Like a Tech Project
Big projects can get out of hand fast, so I’m borrowing a concept from my day job: an Agile approach. Basically, instead of trying to build the whole perfect thing at once, I’m breaking it down into small, manageable chunks, or “sprints.” This way, I can get a working version up and running at each stage and make sure I’m on the right track.
Sprint 1: The Foundation (Getting a Picture to Move)
Before I start building frames, I need to make sure the core tech actually works.
- Go down the AI rabbit hole: I’ll be playing with AI video generators to see if I can create a short, looping video that looks like a classical portrait.
- Get the Pi working: I’ll set up the Raspberry Pi 5 to automatically play a video file on a loop when it boots up.
- First look: The goal for this sprint is simple: have a video playing on the bare monitor. It won’t be pretty, but it’ll be alive!
Sprint 2: The Assembly (Making It Look Like a Painting)
This is where it starts to look less like a pile of electronics and more like something you’d actually hang on a wall.
- Frame build: I’ll get the old monitor mounted securely inside the picture frame. This will probably involve some creative DIY engineering.
- Aesthetics: I’ll paint the frame to give it that authentic, slightly-worn Hogwarts vibe.
- Put it all together: The Raspberry Pi gets tucked away behind the monitor, and the plexiglass goes on top to complete the look. By the end of this sprint, I should have a fully assembled, wall-mountable moving painting!
Sprint 3: The Polish (Adding More Magic)
With the basic version done, it’s time to add some bells and whistles.
- More characters: I’ll create a few different moving portraits so we can swap them out. Maybe a grumpy wizard, a mischievous house-elf… who knows!
- Create a playlist: I’ll configure the Pi to cycle through different videos.
- Add some sound (maybe?): I’m toying with the idea of adding some subtle ambient sounds, like a crackling fire or rustling pages. We’ll see!
This project feels like the perfect mix of my tech skills and a fun, creative challenge. I’m excited to see if I can actually pull it off. I’ll be posting updates as I go, so stay tuned for more magical updates! ✨