Maker Ken Delahoussaye. (Photo by ROBERTO GONZALEZ, ORLANDO SENTINEL / April 23, 2009)
Tech reporter Etan Horowitz wrote a nice piece in today's Orlando Sentinel about makers in his area of the country. Ken Delahoussaye, a MAKE contributor, is profiled. Here's a snippet:
Some of his other projects include a motion detector that plays a sound or video on his computer; a remote-control robot with a camera inside; and a tennis-ball launcher made with electric-scooter motors, a battery used for jump-starting a car and other parts.
"The biggest motivation for me is actually the building of the project," Delahoussaye said.
"Once it's built and it works, there is a satisfaction in that, but the awe is gone."
Etan also has some extra material, videos, and offers some interesting thoughts about pulling the article together on his blog. MAKE magazine is, of course (yay!), mentioned, and there are links to some of Ken's articles and other pertinent Make: Online pages.
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Watching President Obama's speech on Inauguration Day, I had a strange experience of cognitive dissonance as he uttered the above quote. My word, I thought, could he be aware of MAKE and the maker movement?
Either way, he's definitely speaking our language, and that passage and the general tone of his speech, his call to remake America, served as part of the inspiration for this year's Maker Faire and the theme of the forthcoming issue of MAKE.
Today, he did it again. We just got this email from MAKE Senior Editor Phil Torrone saying:
We interrupt this MAKEcation to bring you the following message from the President..
"...think about new and creative ways to engage young people in science and engineering, like science festivals, robotics competitions, and fairs that encourage young people to create, build, and invent -- to be makers of things, not just consumers of things."
It's like he's writing our editorial copy!
Dear Mr. President and First Family, please come to the Maker Faire, May 30-31, San Mateo, CA. We promise you'll be inspired by what you see, hundreds of people, of all ages, doing amazing and innovative backyard science, technology, arts and crafts, people who aren't just sitting around waiting for instructions, but who've rolled up their sleeves and are "remaking America." Join us!
MAKE HQ reports that they had a nice turnout and a fine time this past weekend at Hillsdale Shopping Center in San Mateo. Our compadre Kent Barnes took these photos and has more in his photostream. It was a great opportunity to reach out to people who might otherwise not have previous exposure to MAKE. We'll be doing a few more of such events in the future, so stay tuned. Thanks for takin' the snaps, Kent.
Cy Tymony, a featured maker on Make: television, had a great interview with Ira Flatow on Science Friday last week. For you educators, how do you use projects like these? Does this fulfill a niche in your curriculum? What gaps are present that could be filled by future Make: television episodes?
Green DIY
Didn't get enough Earth Day this week? We'll talk with Cy Tymony, author of the book "Sneaky Green Uses for Everyday Things," about simple green projects you can undertake using objects around your house. Call in with your own DIY projects that somehow reduce, reuse, or recycle in unusual ways. Teachers, find more information about using Science Friday as a classroom resource in the Kids' Connection.
Adafruit industries took a little field trip recently to W/------ project space in Chinatown, NYC to check out Peter Sand's robot-tended garden.
The giant robot creates a garden, plants seeds, waters them and lovingly tends to it - the operator can control the robotics with a game controller and for the Arduino fans, it has an Adafruit protoshield and Arduinos that help the gardening.
In this tutorial, bladesmith Ben Potter shows how he inlays a Celto-Norse design in non-ferrous metals into a steel blade. You can see one of the tutorials of him making one of his incredible blades and hilt here.
Liam sent in this really interesting telemetry project that uses the Make controller as the 'brains' of the system. It's able to serve up real-time data to the pit crew, and anyone with Internet access. Thanks Liam!
Seasoned track racers know what it means to be able to see all their lap times, acceleration and braking points, position on track, speed, etc. While there are relatively inexpensive data loggers that can do this in varying degrees, none have what I want and none can show the data live in the pits. Live data during a race can make a big difference to a driver's performance, and to a hopefully attentive pit crew.
I really like the "Tupperware-like" enclose they chose. It's easy to open, waterproof, and transparent. Be sure to check out the link for a lot more information about the project, including future plans.
The Tin Can app takes advantage of the iPhone's audio ports to send and receive messages using sound. This deceptively unadorned app points the way to jailbreak-free hardware solutions for the iPhone -
For those of you who are technically inclined, Tin Can uses frequency shift keying (FSK) to send data from one iPhone to the other. This is the same technique used by early modems to transmit data.
FSK uses alternating frequencies to represent binary data. For instance, to transmit a '1' using FSK you might use a 4 kHz signal, whereas to transmit a '0' you might use a 3 kHz signal. You would then alternate the two frequencies to send sequences of ones and zeroes.
What we have done, in essence, is turn the iPhone into a simple modem using its speaker and microphone. Pretty cool.
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Leadtowill posted this detail shot of a rather excellent mod/conversion -
This was a cassette radio. I removed the motor etc and added an input to the amp section of the circuit, mounted a spring and converted the speaker to a driver with a knife - the result is a roomy sounding spring reverb. Future additions ---- a filter and feedback section, maybe make use of the radio section as a white noise generator...
Joining the modular forces of Arduino and Lego, Greg and Rael built the above-seen motor shield with a convenient plastic brick interface. Head over to Flickr for more project pics.
Brian Dettmer carefully dissects books into these lovely sculptures that reveal their inner relationships. They'll be on display in Chicago through May 9 at the Packer Schopf Gallery. Via Cool Hunting.
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Andy posted pics of this here classically styled elastic launcher with a tung oil/selective stain finish. He notes it's still a work in progress - either way, looks pretty darn 'snappy' as is.
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MAKE, Volume 13 Our Price: $14.99 MAKE, Volume 13 is our magic issue, loaded with enough tricks to keep your friends and family entertained and mystified for months. Telekinetic pens! Levitating heads! Ghostly blocks! These are just a few of the many terrific magic tricks you'll find in this issue of MAKE. And as always, you'll find dozens of other projects, ideas, tips, and tricks for doing everything from growing giant vegetables to finding lost screws.
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The always-inspiring folks at Oomlout are now showing off a forthcoming Arduino breadboard kit they're working on, a make-your-own 'Dunio built around the ATMega168 chip. The kit will come with the chip, a breadboard, a hook-up wire kit, and all of the support components you need to wire up a working Arduino. If you already have the parts, or would rather just make your own, they give you a parts list. They also have a paper layout sheet you can lay over the breadboard (or just use a reference) to see how everything hooks up onto the board. They hope to have the kt available soon.
Earthshine Design did their own breadboard-based Arduino (above). You can find info on their version here.
One of the great maker tales of the game industry. In 1998, Williams was the world's biggest pinball manufacturer, but they were in trouble. Two legendary designers took their "crazy" idea out of the company and into a garage; the result, "Pinball 2000," became a sensation... until Williams mysteriously pulled the plug. This grass-roots effort to innovate inside corporate America will fascinate any student of technology, design, or business.
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