Make: Online: January 2009 Archives

« December 2008 | Main | February 2009 »

Archives: January 2009

January 2009 Home | Next >

January 31, 2009

Bracketmeister - bulb mode bracketing for digital cameras

Joergen Geerds sent in his solution to long exposure night photography: the Bracketmeister, an Arduino set up that's used with a camera's bulb mode to automate bracketed, long exposure shots.

I do bracket all my night photography, for various reasons: for exposure blending, noise reduction, dynamic range extension etc etc. Unfortunately, Canon thinks that all photographers only need +-2EV brackets, unless you own one of the very big Canons, and that 30 seconds is also enough. Unfortunately, it isn't enough for some of my night panoramas, and I was looking into ways to fix it (that included pleading to Canon, but we all know how far that goes).

So I decided to build my own long-exposure bracket controller, based on the arduino platform, with an Nokia LCD to actually have an user interface, other than a red button, write my own piece of software and test it last night... I call the gadget "Bracketmeister 0.32″ for now. It works like a charm. Now I can have +-3EV (what I was aiming for, but the it does up to +-10EV, possibly more), exposures from 1 sec to 2 hours, and up to 11 shots for each bracket set (can be more). Now no night panorama is impossible anymore.

You can grab the code and build instructions from Joergen's site. Put a nice case around this and it's a handy little item to add to your photo hacker's toolkit.

Long-exposure Night HDR Photography With Arduino

Geeks gather, make stuff

A2Geeksmill
The Ann Arbor Chronicle » Geeks Gather, Make Stuff -

Edwin Olson, assistant professor in the University of Michigan's Computer Science and Engineering department, didn't know beforehand about the A2Geeks Make TV Movie Night, but when he saw robots in the atrium of the CSE building, he figured it was something he might be interested in and stopped to chat. Olson directs the Autonomy, Perception, Robotics, Intelligence, and Learning (APRIL) lab on the third floor of the building.

Movie night was not an A2Geeks event per se. As Dug Song put it, the organization, which he helped form in November 2008, is meant more to support other existing groups than to run its own events. And on Thursday, the existing group getting some geek love from A2Geeks was GoTech.

Dale Grover of GoTech explained that it's an organization for people who like to make things using technology, and that when people come to their monthly meetings (generally the second Tuesday), they bring stuff they've made, like robots, or they spend their time making things, like printed circuit boards. They're the sort of people who enjoy Make Magazine and its TV version, Make Television.

Super Bowl 1/2 time build: Gakken Stirling Engine

A lot of people, including myself, will be watching the Super Bowl this Sunday. One thing that bugs me are all the long commercial breaks. Although it seems a lot of people like the commercials better than the actual game! This year I am going to try something different. I am going push the salsa and chips aside and set up my living room table for a build. I am going to be making the Stirling Engine kit by Gakken during those long commercial breaks. I'll let you know how it goes. Hopefully I can fire it up by the time the game is over. IMG_7182 copy.JPG

I am always amazed at the quality of any of the Gakken kits, and the Stirling engine kit is no exception. I can't wait to get started making this one.

Are you making anything this weekend, or just watching the game? Leave us a note in the comments, Thanks!

Fighting for our "right to repair"

Bill of Rights

Sarah Palermo of the Keene Sentinal has a great piece that affirms the Maker's Bill of Rights:

WINCHESTER -- William L. Morse remembers a young woman who came to his auto repair shop a few months ago with a $3,000 repair bill hanging over her head.

He examined the car, which had been diagnosed by a dealership service shop, and repaired the vehicle for $300, he said.

"I've heard some pretty good horror stories," says Morse, the Bill in Bill's Ashuelot Garage in Winchester.

Many people are sent to dealerships for their repair work because of what he and other independent mechanics see as a monopoly on information.

...

From the time the Model T was introduced until recent years, cars operated on mainly mechanical systems. This gear connected to that belt, and the whole thing went "vrrooom."

When it didn't, a mechanic could open the hood or roll underneath to see which part was broken and fix or replace it.

Now, computers control most of the car, and diagnosing problems means buying and continually updating a computer system that plugs into the car's computer and reports a code, telling the mechanic where the problem is.

The price of the system and the continual upgrades vary, according to technicians and shop owners. Some programs can be $100, while others cost a couple thousand, said Leon Watkins, co-owner of Leon's Auto Center in Keene.

And sometimes, even with a system to translate the code shown on the computer into the appropriate problem, mechanics are still out of luck -- if the code is a brand new one.

Mechanics seek 'right to repair' [via Jon Udell on Twitter]

Drawdio round up - BZZZ BEEEP BLOOP

If you've never seen a kid make a Drawdio - you're missing out. I get asked all the time what's the best kit to build with a son and/or daughter and the Drawdio is my #1 pick. Drawdio is an electronic pencil that lets you make music while you draw - it's a very simple musical synthesizer that uses the conductive properties of pencil graphite to create different sounds. The result is a fun toy that lets you "draw" musical instruments on any piece of paper. If you're old enough to remember Bill Cosby's "Picture pages" it reminds me of Mortimer Ichabod marker.

Back to Drawdio - It's less than $20 (It's $19.50) and there's one day left on our 10% sale so you can pick one up with a nice discount. Use the code 2009OX on check out to get 10% anything in the Maker Shed. Developed by Jay Silver and Adafruit it's a great kit that might spark a lifetime of science and engineering for a kid (or adult!).

I gathered up some of the links, videos and photos of Drawdio in action - check'em out and if you make one post up what you draw (and record video while you draw!). Oh, one more thing - it's an open source hardware project! Don't want to buy a kit, you can make your own!

More:

From the Maker Shed:

Get 10% off your order in the Maker Shed, use code "2009OX" at the time of checkout - Happy Chinese New Year! (Sale ends midnight, Jan 31st!)

Google becomes self aware says every site is harmful and malware... including Google

3241481388 3Dd0Bf683A O
Starting at 9:43am EST 1/31/2009 Google says every site is malware... including Google. A few makers emailed me asking why every site was "malware" - looks like something went really wrong, or really right (for someone).

It's pretty clear what happened - Google became self aware and decided the web is mostly harmful - including itself. Suicidal Skynet...

Update: 30 minutes later it seems to be fixed - I guess John Connor zapped the machines, long live harmful sites!

Make: television Episode 105: Kinetic Wave Sculptures & Shopping Cart Chair

Maketvytbttlogo
ZOOM! Here's something for you BitTorrent & Miro folks... Torrent of Make: television Episode 105: Kinetic Wave Sculptures & Shopping Cart Chair...

Tour the elegant and hypnotic motorized wave sculptures, created by visionary maker Reuben Margolin. In the Maker Workshop John Park upcycles a discarded shopping cart into a stylish easy chair, and Mister Jalopy details the unsung wonders of his 1950 Studebaker. The Maker Channel features a treadmill bike, an obedient, robotic foot stool, a homemade foundry (built by two 14 year old wizards), and an ultra-high-temperature heat ray that can melt brass!

Make: television in HD, is available on public television (see local listings) - also as a torrent, Miro as well as on iTunes, YouTube, blip.tv, vimeo, direct downloads - the first and only TV show in history to do this!

January 30, 2009

Picture of the XO-2 OLPC

First-Leaked-Picture-Of-The-Next-Generation-Xo-2-Olpc-Laptop-2
Leaked picture of the upcoming XO-2 OLPC via netbooknews.de. The next OLPC is being reported to be an open source hardware project too...

It appears that the very first photo of the next-generation OLPC XO 2.0 low-cost laptop has finally emerged on the Internet, showing us some of the things we should be expecting. In addition to that, it looks like Nicholas Negroponte, the founder of the One Laptop Per Child project, has confirmed that the next-generation XO laptop is going for a different design and marketing strategy. To be more specific, the upcoming laptop, which could be released sooner rather than later, will be meant to provide users with a book that can be a laptop as compared with the first XO laptop, which was meant as a laptop that could be a book.

Update: The OLPC press folks emailed back... I asked "will the OLPC be open source hardware"... They said--

That's definitely the intention of everybody at OLPC. However, when you outsource as much as OLPC does, it will be a challenge to persuade partners to open up their intellectual property.

Make: television polecam photo from AOTS

During my appearance on Attack of the Show! this week, Kevin Pereira lined up some crew members to shoot with the Burrito Blaster. Brave souls. This is a photo of them, along with lovely co-host Olivia Munn, that Kevin took using the remote-controlled pole camera rig. One clever thing segment producer Sean Jordan thought of was to tap into the camera's video out so we could monitor what the camera saw. I wish we'd thought of that! This is just a humble point-and-shoot camera, too, so it may be a pretty solid addition to the project. If you want to see what you're shooting, just run a long RCA cable down the pole to a small monitor or video camera with a composite input.

Austin Event: Dorkbot

This beautiful flyer, by Joey Lopez, says it all:

If you're in / near Austin, hope to see you at next Wednesday's Dorkbot!

Besmoke - interactive fluid dynamics

Eric Gradman has created this awesome interactive fluid dynamics program called Besmoke. It is iPhone accelerometer aware and responds to sound input. It is based on Navier-Stokes fluid simulations.

Besmoke - Interactive Fluid Dynamics with iPhone and Sound Reactivity

SSerial2Mobile - SMS library for Arduino

This looks like a handy library for mobile-enabling your next Arduino project:

This library implements the Software serial Arduino library to establish a serial connection to a Mobile phone. The methods methods hides the AT+ commands from the user allowing messages to be sent by passing the method on a phone number or email and the message.

The specific AT commands were made to work with the Motorolla C168i, but you can tweak a header file to adjust things for the specific device you are using. It makes sending an email or SMS almost as easy as a single function call:

Example code:

#define rxPin 2 #define txPin 3 // set up a new serial port SSerial2Mobile phone = SSerial2Mobile(rxPin, txPin); //send a text message phone.sendTxt("+15555550125","Lib SMS Test1");
//send an email phone.sendEmail("sserial2mobile@example.com", "Lib email test1");

The reason the author chose to use the C168i is that you can get the phone on the cheap, without contract, and prepay for SMS service. It's also simple to make a serial cable which connects to a 3/32" stereo plug on the phone. In all, it looks like a pretty simple and cheap task to get this all working.

Note that it's the last day to use code 2009OX during checkout in the Maker Shed for a 10% discount. If you need an Arduino for this, go get one now!

SSerial2Mobile
Attaching a Motorola C168i to an Arduino

Softsynth puts noisy racket in your pocket

No, it's not just a cute lil' change purse - Arlie and Jared's sewn-circuit softsynth combines crafty and noisy in a unnassuming portable package with a snap switch and conductive fabric.

In the Maker Shed:

Lilypad E-Sewing Kit

Don't forget - this week we have a 10% off sale this week in the maker shed, use code "2009OX" at the time of checkout - Happy Chinese New Year!

If DaVinci invented the iPhone

From the makers of Exploded Phone comes the iSteam Phone, a t-shirt depicting an exploded view illustration that asks the musical question: What would the iPhone have looked like if Leonardo had invented it in the 15th century?

iSteam Phone [via Boing Boing Gadgets]

Introducing the Maker'skine

I did a double-take when Collin sent me the link to this Flickr image of a Mini Maker's Notebook. What the...? It's one of our pal's Kent Barnes' "5 Minute Hacks." He made a Maker's Notebook paper book cover for a pocket-size Moleskine. Maybe if we ask real nice, he'll let us post the PDF so you can Maker-fy your own mini notebooks.

Maker'skine

From the Maker Shed:

You can get a gen-u-ine Maker's Notebook in the Maker Shed. And remember: All this week get 10% off your order in the Maker Shed, use code "2009OX" at the time of checkout - Happy Chinese New Year! (This sale ends midnight, Jan 31st!)

MAKE: television premieres in Colorado this weekend!

We just received the news that Rocky Mountain PBS will premiere Make: television this weekend on Sunday, February 1st at 11:30 am!

Episode 1 premieres this weekend and see the schedule for upcoming episodes.

Remember you can always watch Make: television online at makezine.tv. New episodes and the PDFs for the Maker Workshop are posted each week.

Linoleum Asphalt Mosaics - CRAFT Video Podcast

Linoleum asphalt mosaics, also called Toynbee Tiles, are artworks permanently embedded in pavement. In this video I'll show you how to construct your own from inexpensive materials. You can get real linoleum (don't use vinyl flooring) for this project by ordering free samples online. By cutting out a mosaic design in the linoleum and sandwiching it between layers of paper, wood glue, and asphalt crack filler, you can affix the mosaic very permanently to an asphalt surface, such as your driveway. You may choose to use a heat gun to make the linoleum easier to cut, or even a laser cutter. The earliest examples of these tiles were found in the 70s and 80s on streets in Philadelphia, all bearing the same (or very similar) message: "Toynbee idea / in Kubrick's 2001 / resurrect dead / on planet Jupiter." They are speculated to have been created by the same person until they began to gain a following. There's an active message board on the topic which shares sightings and other information. If you make one, please share your pictures in the CRAFT Flickr pool!

Subscribe to the CRAFT Podcast in iTunes, or download the mov, mp4, or iPhone/Android video.

Thanks to my pal Matt Mechtley for his help on this one. In this video I used this cc-licensed photo by Flickr user mojunk. The music is "Regurgitation Pumping Station" from the World of Goo soundtrack by Kyle Gabler; used with permission.

Cross country ski stroller

Aptly named Instructables user dirtydiaperchanger made this X-country ski stroller with relatively inexpensive materials. I hope my brother is reading, since he's got a little one up in Maine where there's five feet of snow.

Building papercrete domes

I blog about Mikey and Wendy's projects very frequently because they're doing so many cool things. One of the most impressive is their papercrete dome, which is now documented in this Instructable:

When my girlfriend (Wendy Tremayne) and I arrived in southern New Mexico one of the first things we did was look around for a local building material. Clay would need to be excavated and hauled in, straw bale was already expensive and not local, manufactured building materials like rastra were a little too off the shelf for us. We ended up settling on what we had locally available and that was/is paper. It is common for small remote towns to not have much in the way of recycling. Our town was collecting paper, but more often than not would just dump it in the landfill after collection. They were happy to help us load our truck up with their newspaper which was mostly a nuisance to them. We later found a source of rebar being made from old cars within a 100 miles of our place.
Since we would have a lot of batteries and solar PV equipment that needed a good home we decided to do our first structure as a battery room for our solar equipment. Domes are inherently strong and energy efficient structures. This is how we started building a battery dome from paper.

Great, inspiring work, y'all!

In the Maker Shed: January recap

2009 has only just begun and we have already featured 5 builds from the Maker Shed. It's been a lot of fun, but now we need your help. Is there anything from the Maker Shed that you would like to see us build? Maybe there is a kit that you just aren't sure how it works, or what it sounds like? Let us know, we would love some input from our readers. Leave your suggestions in the comments below. I can't promise I can build them all, but I'll try. Thanks!

All this week get 10% off you order in the Maker Shed, use code "2009OX" at the time of checkout - Happy Chinese New Year!

Here is what we have made so far in 2009:

How-to Tuesday: Maker's Notebook