John Edgar Park, one pixel at a time
My friend, the incredible Gareth Branwyn mentioned that he had a doctor’s visit to a few of us who write for Make: Online. We got to wondering what exactly he was up to. This video cleared things up:
I made it by doing some motion tracking in After Effects and then linking a couple of photos to that tracking data.
I met Sylvia at Maker Faire — she’s a big fan of Make: television. She was actually the first person at Maker Faire to test out the Rail-O-Graph train messaging system! Sylvia posted a very nice thank you on her blog:
Thank you so much for doing such a great job being a maker! And showing kids like me how to do make cool stuff. Also thank you for signing my book and letting me get a picture with you. I’m going to tell all my friends at school that I met you.. They’re going to be soo jealous!
love, Sylvia
I picked up this great box of headsets for $5 at a garage sale. What to do with them?
I went to a wonderful talk at Machine Project tonight by Jason Torchinsky about the history of mechanical television. Mid-way through his excellent and hilarious talk we paused to watch KTLA pull the lever on its analog TV broadcast. It was a very bittersweet moment actually.
My friend Gareth Branwyn heard I was testing the Epilog Zing laser cutter and asked if I could cut him the parts for a 4Volt Jansen Walker. Gar is a robot master and a steampunk to the core (check out his Lost Technology issue of Make: magazine for more proof) so I figured clear acrylic wouldn’t do it. He needed a wooden walker! I’m going to convince him to purchase brass nuts and bolts for the built, and maybe he can use small steam engines instead of servos and swap in a Babbage Machine for the Arduino…
For more on the beautiful 4Volt Jansen Walker: http://4volt.com/Projects/Jansen/
And, the original, inspiring, wonderful, otherworldly Jansen Walker that inspired Mr. 4Volt: http://www.strandbeest.com/
I’m still putting this loaner Epilog Zing laser cutter (I call her “Betty”) through her paces for a review I’m writing. The problem is this: I can never be finished testing. There are endless possibilities of what you can create.
I realize you’re all sick of the earbud owls by now, but I’ve also been doing enclosures and other 2D-to-3D constructions that are more precise and functional that anything I could reasonably build by hand.
Which is why you see me wining and dining her here with a Byzantine Cocktail. Romantic? Yes. Weird? Possibly. Will it end in heartbreak? Inevitably.
Where: In the Make: magazine booth at Bay Area Maker Faire ‘09.
When: Friday before the Faire (which opened on Saturday)
Who: Windell Oskay and Lenore Edman of Evil Mad Scientist Labs, and Mark Frauenfelder of MAKE and BoingBoing.
What: a terrifying solder job on the back of their Peggy 2 kit (it looked like the leads were clipped by gnawing on them!)
Why: This board was built very quickly for the magazine photo shoot
Not trying to make fun of whoever put it together, I just loved this look on Windell’s face as he realized he was going to have to take the board home and do some major resoldering. He did, and it looked great!
Usman and I are smiling because a) we’re sitting, b) we saw so much cool stuff at the Faire, c) we met so many excellent people, and d) we won an Editor’s Choice award for our Rail-O-Graph.
Usman and I will be demonstrating the Rail-O-Graph in the mornings at the Make: magazine booth. We’ll do a talk at 2pm on Saturday and 12:45 on Sunday on the project. On Sunday at 2pm, Mark Frauenfelder and I will talk about coffee hacks. We’ll have some fun stuff on hand, including Mark’s modified espresso machine, the Florence Siphon brewer I built, a new, miniature version of my hydraulic espresso tamper, and more. Can’t wait to see you there!
The Railographic Apparatus uses a train to deliver messages between terminal stations. My first tests were with HO scale trains. These were very helpful in testing the Arduino + Adafruit MotorShield, but proved to be a bit to small and unstable to lug around all the gear we wanted to use.
