Saturday was the first Electronics Flea Market for 2008. We went, a little late as usual, but early for us. When we got our coffee and donuts at 8:30, there were already some vendors packing up; they had been there for hours and sold enough to call it a day. The weather was beautiful, and we all got sunburned, but we also took home a nice haul of goodies.
Above: the pretty stuff put in a cigar box for the benefit of photographers like me.
For all of our different AVR microcontroller based projects, we seem to find ourselves continually wiring up minimalist target boards; little circuit boards that fit both the AVR and a 6-pin header for connecting to your in-system programmer. And, when you find yourself hand-wiring the same circuit over and over again on a protoboard, that’s really just life’s way of telling you “just lay out a damn printed circuit board already.”
Coincidentally, we needed a new business card.
Continue reading Tiny portable AVR projects: Business card breakout boards
Tomorrow (Monday 3/3/08) at TechShop in Menlo Park, CA, I’m giving another AVR intro class. These classes have been big, lively, engaging and interesting, with a lot of good questions– two sessions are scheduled this month:
Monday, 3/3/08, 6:30-8:30 PM, and
Saturday, 3/22/08, 1:00-3:00 PM
Seminar: Introduction to AVR Microcontrollers
AVR microcontrollers are powerful and versatile single-chip computers that cost only a few dollars each. You may have noticed that a number of our interesting projects are based around these, using them to make smart little toys and machines.
This class is aptly billed by TechShop as “How To Use AVR Microcontrollers in Your Projects.” Indeed. We’ll be bringing along a number of our cool AVR-based Evil Mad Scientist Laboratories projects from to show off some of the things that you can do with these little marvels, and how you might go about doing it.
Formal class description: “AVR microcontrollers are powerful, versatile and inexpensive single-chip computers that are remarkably easy to program in C, using entirely free and open-source tools that run on Macs, Windows, and Unix-like operating systems. In this practical introduction to AVR microcontrollers, we’ll take it from the beginning so that you can get started using them for your own cool projects. Some topics to be covered include: different types of AVRs and how to pick one for your application, getting a programmer, installing software tools, how to get started actually programming them, and how to download and run your code on the microcontroller. Class format is a one hour lecture followed by show-and-tell demonstrations and ample time for questions.”
Sign up here.
Seats are still available in one other microcontroller project class:
Soldering Project: Build a Micro Readerboard
A fun little soldering class, where you can customize the phrases in and build your very own LED Micro-Readerboard. It’s a cute little toy that spells out a preprogrammed messages (e.g., your name– for an LED nametag!), one letter at a time, on its display. In the class, you get to choose what messages to put on your readerboard, solder it together and take it home. It’s a neat, self-contained project that’s a great example of what you can do with a little AVR microcontroller; a perfect “my first microcontroller” project for anyone who hasn’t played with one yet. This is an intermediate soldering class; some prior soldering experience is needed. Other than that, no prior knowledge is assumed, so this class is great for kids too.
Next Classes:
Sign up here!
Nothing makes us more gleefully happy than taking things apart. On the table today: a pedometer. Lots of gory pictures after the jump.
Adapted from the original by John Shadle, and used by kind permission. (Thanks!)
With all the cool things that you can do with LEDs today, there is still one thing that’s lacking: simplicity. If you want to run a bunch of LEDs at a time, you usually end up spending a fair bit of time worrying about series and parallel combinations, matching brightness, and picking load resistors. Or, if you’re a beginner, maybe you only get one third of the way through the previous sentence– wondering if you’re already in over your head.
Suppose that you want to make a big LED display for your window or wall: maybe it’s your logo, a symbol, your favorite 8-bit character, or maybe even a sign that spells out words like “OPEN” or “ON AIR.” How do you go about it? The usual DIY solution involves drilling holes in a panel to fit your LEDs, then spending a heck of a lot of time wiring everything up– ending up with one resistor per LED (and a three-dimensional mess if you happen to look at the back side of the panel). And, if you do everything in the most obvious ways, it can even end up consuming a surprising amount of power.
While I have certainly spent my share of time constructing things with the aforementioned technique, at some point it becomes clear that there has to be a better way. In this day and age, shouldn’t LEDs be about as difficult to play with as, say, a Lite Bright? Today we are releasing a new open-source hardware and software design that takes some of the sting, complexity, and mess out of playing with LEDs. It’s a versatile and powerful light-emitting pegboard that lets you efficiently drive hundreds of LEDs in whatever configuration you like, without so much as calculating a single load resistor.
Continue reading “Peggy,” A Light Emitting Pegboard Display
Starting next week and over the next few months, I’ll be teaching several different self-contained microcontroller-oriented classes at TechShop, at different levels of skill and with different emphases:
The classes are held at TechShop, a San Francisco Bay Area “open-access public workshop,” located just off of 101 in Menlo Park, where you can go use a wide range of tools to make things, and take all kinds of classes.
Soldering Project: Build a Micro Readerboard
This is a fun little soldering class, suitable for anyone with a bit of soldering experience (even youngsters), where you can customize the phrases in and build your very own LED Micro-Readerboard. It’s a cute little thing that spells out a preprogrammed messages (e.g., your name), one letter at a time, on a single-character alphanumeric display. In the class, you get to choose what messages to put on your readerboard, solder it together and take it home. It’s a neat, self-contained project that’s a great example of what you can do with a little AVR microcontroller. This is an intermediate soldering class; a little bit of prior soldering experience is assumed. The class typically runs about 90 minutes, but soldering experts will finish more quickly and we’ve reserved space for two hours just in case. Class size is limited to 5 students.
This class is scheduled to be given
Sign up here.
And speaking of AVR Microcontrollers….
Seminar: Introduction to AVR Microcontrollers
AVR microcontrollers are powerful and versatile single-chip computers that cost only a few dollars each. You may have noticed that a number of our interesting projects are based around these, using them to make smart little toys and machines.
This class is aptly billed by TechShop as “How To Use AVR Microcontrollers in Your Projects.” Indeed. We’ll be bringing along a number of our cool AVR-based Evil Mad Scientist Laboratories projects from to show off some of the things that you can do with these little marvels, and how you might go about doing it.
Formal class description: “AVR microcontrollers are powerful, versatile and inexpensive single-chip computers that are remarkably easy to program in C, using entirely free and open-source tools that run on Macs, Windows, and Unix-like operating systems. In this practical introduction to AVR microcontrollers, we’ll take it from the beginning so that you can get started using them for your own cool projects. Some topics to be covered include: different types of AVRs and how to pick one for your application, getting a programmer, installing software tools, how to get started actually programming them, and how to download and run your code on the microcontroller. Class format is a one hour lecture followed by show-and-tell demonstrations and ample time for questions.”
This class is scheduled to be given
And speaking of programming….
Soldering Project: Build an AVR Programmer
In this class you will solder together, test out and get to take home a USB programmer for AVR microcontrollers. With this hardware tool and free cross-platform software, you can use your computer to write code for and program these little one-chip wonders.
This is an Intermediate Soldering Project; you must have prior soldering experience. You are encouraged, but not required, to bring a laptop along. (If you do bring your computer, you should have a chance to install the necessary software and test it out with your new programmer.)
Class size is limited to 5 students.
This class is scheduled to be given
Sign up for these and other TechShop classes here.
The Evil Mad Science Auxiliary is a public group on Flickr for anyone to add photos that are (at least marginally) related to posts and projects from Evil Mad Scientist Laboratories.
Lately some fantastic photos and projects have shown up in the group, so we thought that we should stop and round up a few– not all– of the great things that we’ve seen there.
The photos below were taken by their respective owners; click on the individual photos to get the full story.
A dark detector built by cyenobite, using a tiny battery holder.
Beautiful Joule Thief light by Jimmie Rodgers
Adam Greig has been having fun with AlphaPOV. (Results here.)
Francesco (Flickr user fdecomite) made this amazing army of BristleBots, photographed with the help of his spiffy LED ring light. He even made some excellent videos of the little guys in action.
Steve Lodefink has been busy building up this set of electronics for an extra-spiffy handlheld blaster. Based on 555 and 4017 chips, it has some elements in common with our little cylon circuit. I can’t wait to see what it looks like when it’s done!
Channon (Flickr user plik the geek) is building up one of our interactive LED kits.
He also decorated his office printer with an overly honest label. (Coincidentally, we also did this to our own office printer.)
Speaking of interactive LED kits, A Oli Wood contributed this fabulous time exposure of his completed circuit.
So… If you’ve got pictures or projects that were in some way inspired by our projects, we would as always love to see them in the Auxiliary. And to everyone who has contributed, thanks for your cool pictures!
Check out these neat chips that I picked up at a Silicon Valley junk shop.
They’ve got pins on the bottom and a socket on top. Wait– what?!?
Continue reading A funny looking chip
The BristleBot is a simple and tiny robot with an agenda. The ingredients? One toothbrush, a battery, and a pager motor. The result? Serious fun.
(YouTube video here.)
The BristleBot is our take on the popular vibrobot, a simple category of robot that is controlled by a single vibrating (eccentric) motor. Some neat varieties include the mint-tin version as seen in Make Magazine (check the video), and the kid’s art bot: a vibrobot with pens for feet.
Continue reading Bristlebot: A tiny directional vibrobot
