All posts by Lenore Edman

About Lenore Edman

Co-founder of Evil Mad Scientist Laboratories.

Linkdump: May 2015

By on

linux alarm clock

This entry was posted in Everything Else and tagged . Bookmark the Permalink.

Analog Education and the 555

By on

The article Can Analog Circuits Inspire Budding Engineers? over at Planet Analog discusses preparing students for dealing with real world circuitry by getting them started with analog circuits.

By building, probing, and observing the signals and their changes in these circuits without any code requirements, students can get a real feel for otherwise abstract concepts such as voltage, current, and more.

The author uses examples of projects and kits including our very own Three Fives Kit.

This entry was posted in Electronics, Engineering. Bookmark the Permalink.

MakerCon 2015

By on

MakerCon is a short conference put on by Maker Media in the week leading up to Maker Faire about the business of making.

Gael with InMoov

3D printing is a common maker topic, and MakerCon brought a few different twists to it. Above is Gael demonstrating InMoov, an open source 3D printed humanoid robot. There was also an incredibly inspiring talk about applications for medical 3D printing by Dr. Glenn Green.

Gigabot print

3D printing can be whimsical as well, as demonstrated by this “25 mm” drill bit by Gigabot.

Strawbees

The folks from Strawbees had built a quadcopter rotor cage with a clever servo actuator for flapping sculptural wings.

Clever flex design

I enjoyed seeing this attractive laser cut living hinge at the BotFactory demo.

Rogue Rover

Rogue Rovers are electric semi-autonomous ATVs designed for agricultural use to reduce farm injuries and pollution.

More pictures from the event are in my flickr album.

This entry was posted in Field Trips, Open Hardware, Robotics. Bookmark the Permalink.

Maker Faire Panel: 10 Years of Maker Faire

By on
Maker Faire 2008
EepyBird at Maker Faire 2008 by Skip Russell

I am extremely excited that I’ll be  at Maker Faire moderating the panel Looking Back at Maker Faire on Sunday, May 17 at 11 am on Center Stage.

My panelists include long-time Maker Faire stars:

Maker Faire 2010
Mark Frauenfelder at Maker Faire 2010 by Kent K. Barnes

This year’s program guide (pdf) with event highlights is now available for download. For fun and to get in the spirit of my panel, check out Make’s post about the program guide from the very first Maker Faire!

Maker Faire Bay Area 2011: Super Awesome Sylvia
Super Awesome Sylvia at Maker Faire 2011 by Steve Hoefer
This entry was posted in Field Trips. Bookmark the Permalink.

Fab Academy CNC Workstation Cart

By on

CNC Workstation cart from Fab Academy
Erin posted on the Make blog about large scale CNC projects at Fab Academy, including a CNC workstation cart based on our design made by Lina Monaco. Lina goes into more details in her post here.

To design it I started from the Evil Mad Scientist’s CNC Workstation Cart redrawing to adapted it to our necessity as an horizontal PC, cables space inside, and last but not least without any screw or glue.

No screw no glue drawers

She posts about her design process, including prototyping using a laser cutter to make a scale model. It looks great—we especially like the cutout drawer handle design.

This entry was posted in CNC. Bookmark the Permalink.

Genetic Algorithm Pattern Generator for EggBot

By on

David Bliss posted about using a genetic algorithm to create designs for the EggBot using Processing. He says, “Each design is a sine wave with eight different parameters.”

Each time the program is run, an initial population is created with 50 individual designs — each with random values assigned to the eight parameters. You then rate each individual design before evolving the next generation. The algorithm chooses individuals to carry on to the next generations (highly rated designs are more likely to be carried forward, but low rated designs may still be used).

Each of the eggs in the photo above was printed from the same program with waves evolved from random seeds.

He has shared his code on Github for this project, as well as earlier ones.

This entry was posted in Eggbot. Bookmark the Permalink.

Blinky AVR Earrings

By on

Blinky AVR Earring

Look what just arrived in the mail– Blinky AVR Earrings!

Blinky AVR Earrings

Not long ago, Rick posted on twitter about the ATtiny84 blinky earrings he had made, inspired by my voltage regulator earrings (which I now fasten on with the appropriate phillips screw).

Four blue LEDs blink in sequence, powered by a CR1220 battery. The board is traditional OSHPark purple, with an ISP header for convenient reprogramming. They’re lighter than they look and quite comfortable.

Thank you, Rick! I know what I’ll be wearing to Maker Faire!

This entry was posted in Art, Electronics, Microcontrollers and tagged . Bookmark the Permalink.