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Anton Frolov commissioned an environment illustrator to depict his home, then used the artwork as the basis for an interactive Home Assistant dashboard. The project layers device images, animations and status readings over the house illustration; Frolov says his family now enjoys using the dashboard.
Anton Frolov turned a custom, hand-drawn illustration of his house into an interactive Home Assistant dashboard, placing controls and live status information over depictions of the rooms and garden. In his report, Frolov says the redesign addressed a practical problem: other members of his household did not want to use his previous dashboard, even though some home devices still needed manual control.
Frolov says he had spent about a year automating his home with Home Assistant, the open-source smart home platform. Automations handled tasks such as switching off air conditioners when the household left and adjusting garden sprinkler run time based on weather. But the garden lights still required an app, and a timer that switched them off meant someone had to extend the timer before it expired. Frolov writes that his family was not using the existing dashboard to do that.
After considering floor-plan dashboards, including 3D and pixel-art styles, Frolov commissioned an environment artist whose portfolio showed illustrated spaces. He provided a house plan, room photos, visual references, examples of dashboards and a technical brief. That brief specified transparent image files, day and night versions, and separate device artwork for different states. The assets were to share one canvas size and keep each item in its correct position, which Frolov says helped avoid later alignment work.
For the implementation, Frolov used Home Assistant’s standard picture-elements card. The illustration serves as the background, while image elements, icons, labels and conditional elements sit above it. Device imagery can change with device state; the article describes still images for off states and animated images for on states. The supplied report excerpt ends while explaining the technical setup, so it does not provide the full configuration or details of every interaction.
A More Usable Home Control Screen
The project highlights a common tension in smart-home setups: automation can reduce routine effort, but residents may still need a clear, accessible way to control devices when an automation does not fit the moment. Frolov’s example centers on garden lighting, where a timed shutoff created a need for someone to intervene through an app.
His approach also puts visual design at the center of a dashboard that might otherwise be a collection of buttons and readings. Frolov says his family enjoys using the illustrated version, but that is his account of the result rather than an independently tested finding. The practical takeaway is that custom artwork can be paired with Home Assistant’s existing interface tools, though commissioning and preparing the artwork took substantial work.
From Automation to Illustration
Frolov’s report describes a home where many functions already ran automatically, including climate control and weather-responsive irrigation. The remaining issue was not a lack of automation but the need for household members to operate certain controls manually. He considered installing a physical switch for the lights, but says that would not address the timer and would not suit every device, such as starting a sprinkler from indoors.
He initially explored floor-plan dashboards and found examples using 3D models and pixel art. He preferred the idea of a distinctive illustrated environment, then sought an artist with experience drawing rooms. Frolov says finding and booking an artist, agreeing on the deliverables and preparing reference materials made up much of the project’s work. He recommends planning file formats, lighting variations and consistent image dimensions before illustration begins.
““This is my Home Assistant dashboard, and for the first time, it’s one the whole family actually enjoys using.””
— Anton Frolov
Costs and Results Not Provided
The supplied report does not state what the illustration cost, how long the artist took, or which artist completed the commission. It also does not give an independent measure of whether household members used the new dashboard more often or whether the change resolved the garden-light timer issue in practice.
The provided text cuts off during the explanation of how animated device images work. It therefore does not establish the complete configuration, all supported device states, or whether the dashboard uses additional custom components beyond the standard card described. Frolov’s account is a personal project report, not a comparative evaluation of dashboard designs.
The Build Depends on Its Assets
Frolov’s report presents the dashboard as a personal build rather than a product launch, and the supplied material does not announce a release date, downloadable artwork or a broader rollout. Readers seeking to reproduce the project would need to prepare their own home references, agree on compatible deliverables with an illustrator and place the images and controls in Home Assistant.
The article excerpt indicates that the next technical steps involve assigning the illustration as the picture-elements background and positioning the device images and status labels over it. Frolov also notes that he converted sprite-sheet artwork to animated WebP himself and suggests asking for WebP files at the outset. The full configuration and any further explanation of the implementation are not included in the source material provided here.
Key Questions
What is the Home Assistant dashboard in this report?
It is an interactive house illustration used as a smart-home interface. Device images, icons and status labels are placed over the artwork so a user can see the home and its controls together.
How did Frolov build the interface?
He used Home Assistant’s picture-elements card for the illustrated background and layered elements. The report names image, icon, state-label and conditional elements as parts of the setup.
Why commission an illustrator?
Frolov says his household did not want to use his earlier dashboard, while devices such as garden lights still required manual control. He wanted a more appealing interface that reflected the actual house.
What artwork files did the project require?
Frolov’s brief requested transparent images, separate day and night versions, and individual device assets for different states, all aligned on a shared canvas. He says animated WebP would have been preferable to the sprite sheets he first requested.
Did the new dashboard solve the household’s control problems?
Frolov reports that his family enjoys using the new dashboard, but the supplied material does not include usage data or an independent assessment. It describes the motivation and design, not a measured comparison of household behavior.
Source: hn
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