For the AT Open House this year I wanted to try something different. I’ve had in my mind for a long time some plans for a kind of print dispenser, one that people could use and then receive a fortune or an idiom. After roughing out a few designs and finalising a mechanism that would allow the machine to be used unattended I came up with my final designs for a Fortune Teller. The inside houses a selection of rolled up prints. You first place a token in the slot at the top, place your hand on the palm reader (which vibrates and lights up), before then turning the handle to receive your fortune from the slot at the base.

The project uses a combination of a simple electronic circuit to make the hand vibrate and flash when touched, whilst the prints are ejected from the unit via a hopper attached to a bike chain and crank.