# Using SmithTek 3DM Canvas for a home automation project

**URL:** <https://discourse.nodered.org/t/using-smithtek-3dm-canvas-for-a-home-automation-project/101865>\
**Category:** Share Your Projects\
**Created:** [6 October 2026 12:46 UTC](https://discourse.nodered.org/t/using-smithtek-3dm-canvas-for-a-home-automation-project/101865 "2026-10-06T12:46:40Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![dynamicdave](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex026/user_avatar/discourse.nodered.org/dynamicdave/32/96_2.png) [@dynamicdave](https://discourse.nodered.org/u/dynamicdave)\
**Post date:** [6 October 2026 12:46 UTC](https://discourse.nodered.org/t/using-smithtek-3dm-canvas-for-a-home-automation-project/101865/1 "2026-10-06T12:46:41Z")

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Although **SmithTek 3DM SCADA Canvas** is primarily aimed at creating dashboards for industrial applications such as process control, it can also be used very effectively for home-based projects where a flexible and/or creative dashboard layout is required.

Here's a link to the [SmithTek 3DM Canvas node details](https://flows.nodered.org/node/smithtek-3dm-scada-canvas), including examples and installation instructions.

### My Home Sensor Project

In my particular case, I have four sensor nodes located around the exterior of my house. They report **temperature, humidity and atmospheric pressure** , as well as providing **infrared detection for security purposes**.

All of this information is sent to **Node-RED via a private local MQTT broker** , where it can be processed and displayed.

I also have an experimental **ESP32-NOW network** , consisting of a **Base Station, Relay Station and several Remote Sensor nodes**. This network collects additional information, which is also passed to Node-RED using MQTT.

### Connecting Node-RED to 3DM Canvas

One of the things I particularly like about 3DM Canvas is how easy it is to integrate with an existing Node-RED system.

As shown below, it was very straightforward to create a small Node-RED flow to re-format the MQTT payload into the structure required by 3DM Canvas.

 ![3DM Node-RED flow](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/flex026/uploads/nodered/original/3X/b/4/b4c96f7f914ca8fdfa45e64a7e66ebcc03bd7212.jpeg)

### Dashboard for the Four Home Sensors

The next step was to create a 3DM dashboard for my four external sensors.

I found a suitable PNG image on the Internet and resized it so that it worked well within the 3DM Canvas environment.

 ![3DM home sensor dashboard](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/flex026/uploads/nodered/original/3X/c/5/c57bf60b77659d5ef1b59d7511136cc62f331df4.jpeg)

I used a **Table widget** to display the current **temperature, humidity and pressure** , together with the **time the last reading was received** , for each of the four sensor nodes.

This gives me a simple at-a-glance view of the current conditions around the house.

### ESP32-NOW Network Dashboard

My next project was to create a dashboard for the ESP32-NOW network.

The basic approach was exactly the same as for the home sensors — I created a suitable background image and then added a number of Table widgets to display the information being received from the different nodes.

 ![ESP32-NOW network dashboard](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/flex026/uploads/nodered/original/3X/1/8/181c55aabb08e132339d1385d640760c005df878.jpeg)

I then experimented with the layout and added some additional widgets to produce a cleaner and more informative display where the function of the various nodes is colour coordinated.

 ![ESP32-NOW network dashboard – revised](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/flex026/uploads/nodered/original/3X/7/3/7391b06bd21307483c8aaafc951040d9bfe13710.jpeg)

### Using Actions for Drill-Down Information

One particularly useful feature is the **Action widget** , which allows an element on the dashboard to be used to trigger an action — in my case, to **drill down to a more detailed page**.

This makes it possible to keep the main dashboard relatively uncluttered while still providing access to more detailed information when required.

 ![ESP32-NOW network – drill-down](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/flex026/uploads/nodered/original/3X/0/0/0044b54736c3a02ab9f6fc90f243dff6cc18c48e.jpeg)

### Conclusion

Although 3DM Canvas is clearly capable of producing sophisticated industrial SCADA interfaces, I have found that it is equally useful for smaller home automation and IoT projects.

The combination of **MQTT, Node-RED and 3DM Canvas** provides a very flexible way of collecting data from a variety of devices and then presenting that information in a visually appealing and highly customised dashboard.

For anyone already using Node-RED, I think 3DM Canvas is well worth investigating, particularly if the standard Node-RED dashboard components don't provide the flexibility or visual appearance you are looking for.

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**Author:** ![mudwalker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@mudwalker](https://discourse.nodered.org/u/mudwalker)\
**Post date:** [6 October 2026 16:18 UTC](https://discourse.nodered.org/t/using-smithtek-3dm-canvas-for-a-home-automation-project/101865/2 "2026-10-06T16:18:06Z")

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Looks good Dave!

Knocked this up this afternoon (the fan at the bottom left is 'spinning')...

 ![image](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/flex026/uploads/nodered/original/3X/5/a/5a509e77dfdf5e48b9d8b08891ebf032463f076a.jpeg)