virtual pet | progress: lcd screen works !

I made some of my own characters using this :

byte customChar1[8] = {
0b01110,
0b10011,
0b10011,
0b11111,
0b01110,
0b00000,
0b00000,
0b00000
};
byte customChar2[8] = {
0b00000,
0b00000,
0b00000,
0b00000,
0b00000,
0b00000,
0b10001,
0b01110
};
byte customChar3[8] = {
0b00000,
0b00000,
0b01110,
0b01010,
0b01110,
0b00000,
0b00000,
0b00000
};
byte customChar4[8] = {
0b00011,
0b00011,
0b00000,
0b00000,
0b00000,
0b00000,
0b00000,
0b00000
};
byte customChar5[8] = {
0b00100,
0b01010,
0b01010,
0b10001,
0b10001,
0b01010,
0b01010,
0b00100
};
byte customChar6[8] = {
0b00001,
0b00001,
0b00010,
0b00010,
0b00100,
0b01100,
0b11000,
0b00000
};

I created each character by declaring its class in the setup, along with its name and corresponding number, then printed it character by character, line by line:

void setup() {
lcd.createChar(0, customChar1);
lcd.createChar(1, customChar2);
lcd.createChar(3, customChar3);
lcd.createChar(4, customChar4);
lcd.createChar(5, customChar5);
lcd.createChar(6, customChar6);

lcd.begin(16, 2);

lcd.print("(");
lcd.print((char)6);
lcd.print((char)0);
lcd.print((char)1);
lcd.print((char)0);
lcd.print(" )");
lcd.print((char)6);
lcd.print((char)3);
lcd.print("*:");
lcd.print((char)3);
lcd.print((char)4);
lcd.print((char)5);
}

In the loop function, I moved to the bottom row and am displaying a timer:

void loop() {
lcd.setCursor(0, 1);
lcd.print(millis() / 1000);
}

Here’s a video with the screen hooked up to a potentiometer, which controls the backlight: