John Edgar Park, one pixel at a time
This is my hydraulic espresso tamper in mid-build. I’ll be doing a talk at 2pm on 5/3 and 5/4 at Maker Faire about a few of the contraptions I’ve built and written about in Make Magazine.
In this photo my disembodied arm is very excitedly causing the gauge to indicate the 30 lbs. of pressure it’s imparting to the poor defenseless Ikea end table.
This is an old RF ammeter I picked up for cheap at Norton Sales (a surplus equipment heaven here in Los Angeles). I was planning to use a couple of these with the Chronulator clock kit by bypassing the RF coil and going straight to the meter. The Chronulator kits are sold out at the moment, so I may need to find a different option for my crazy retro clock needs.
These are the illuminated guts of the $9 LED ring light I’m building for my friend Darren’s magic act. The brightness and diffuse light quality are just perfect. I still need to build the RF relay circuit to flip it on and off at will from across the stage.
This is the beast what makes the beautiful donuts aboard Gypsy, the Carpe Donut cart.
We visited my parents, my sister Silvia, and her family in Charlottesville, VA last week. Among the many wonderful things we did was visit Carpe Donut, a donut cart run by some friends of my sister. The donuts are organic, made to order, and scrumptious.
Here’s the Earth Day hook: owner Matt Rohdie is planning to convert the truck that pulls the trailer to run on biodiesel. Where will he get the oil? From the donuts!
My parents just gave me this coffee grinder, which has been in our family since the 1890s. Made in Philadelphia by the Enterprise Mfg. Co., it was used by my great Gram Knox for years, until my great Aunt Gertie decided to have it converted into a lamp. My parents had it in our house, and as a kid I was always fascinated by it. I have now begun to un-convert it back into a grinder by removing the lamp parts.
When people turned these into lamps they often tossed out the grinder plates in the process. Not this one. One was removed, but placed in the grounds drawer for safekeeping. There are still grounds collected in its nooks and crannies! I still need to pull it apart to re-install the loose plate. I may even give it a whirl to see how it grinds, but I mostly plan to use it as decoration.
That little, insane hamster there is Rhino. My friend Hide and I rigged him for the movie “Bolt” which comes out November 26, 2009. Being such a cute, simply shaped fat guy he was a huge challenge to rig, but I’m very excited about how good he looks in the hands of our amazing animators. This render comes from a Hollywood Reporter story on Disney releasing all of its films in stereoscopic 3D (the kind with the glasses).
If you have ever wondered what I would like for a gift, the answer is one of Lockwasher’s robots.
I’m willing to bet many of you are already aware of his amazing work, but how can you ever get tired of looking at it? He builds these beauties out of recycled bits of junk.
I couldn’t wait any longer. I made a cappuccino this morning with the Espresso Monkey Blend beans I roasted. It was delicious. Mmm, I wish I had another one right now.
This is a render of Doris, the evil bowler hat I rigged for Disney’s Meet the Robinsons. Art imitates life: a phenomenal robot builder named Matt Denton created a hexapod with beautifully fluid movement that can “watch” you with some facial recognition software. Check out this amazing video, then explain to me why we aren’t all doomed to lives of servitude to our clacking, metallic masters.
