Category Archives: Field Trips

Young Makers at the Exploratorium

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We’re thrilled to be heading back to the Exploratorium this Saturday for the first Young Makers event put on by Make, the Exploratorium, TechShop, and Pixar.

Here’s a little bit about the program from Make’s writeup: “It’s a first experiment in a new program we call Young Makers, in which we intend to create an infrastructure to nurture kids who want to learn by making, beyond what they can do with construction kits. We hope to fulfill a dire need: satisfying a little bit of what shop classes used to do before they, lamentably, started getting booted out of schools.”

We hope to see you there this Saturday between 11 am and 3 pm. There will be BristleBot building going on, as well as BlinkyBug building with our friend Ken Murphy. Ken also has an exhibit called A History of the Sky that is at the Exploratorium through the end of the month and is definitely worth seeing. If you can’t make it this weekend, they’ve got a great line-up of folks for the last Saturday of each month leading up to Maker Faire:


February 27th: Wearables & Soft Circuitry — Adrian Freed

March 27th: Make Your Own Kind of Music — Walter Kitundu and Krys Bobrowski

April 24th: Motors & Mechanisms — Brad Prether and Ernie Fosselius

Update: Dale Dougherty posted an article about the event here.

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ComBots Cup IV this weekend!

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ComBots

Come join us at the ComBots Cup at the San Mateo Fairgrounds on Saturday, December 19 and Sunday, December 20 from 2-7 pm. (Get tickets here.) And if taking your loved ones to see combat robotics wasn’t gift enough, you can do a little last minute holiday shopping without having to brave the mall! We’ll have a selection of kits (and a few robot repair parts) on hand. You can try out Meggy Jr RGB and see the new Bulbdial Clock in person.

Read more about the event at Suicide Bots. Special treat for our readers who attend: mention this post and we’ll give you an RGB LED in your choice of style. Hope to see you there!

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Fabbing at Maker Faire

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MakerBot Tour


CandyFab managed to infiltrate a couple of the other 3D printing projects at Maker Faire this past weekend. That’s me above, at the MakerBot booth, in my brand-new MakerBot shirt, explaining MakerBot to some Maker Faire visitors. Below, Kenji’s Fab at Home sports a brand new CandyFab vinyl racing sticker. CandyFab itself performed like a champ, printing candy and raising blood sugar levels all weekend while we talked shop with all the other fabbers.


FabatHome

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A visit to the electronics markets of Shenzhen

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IMG_8320
I’ve just returned from a week long trip to Shenzhen, China in a “geek tour” trip organized by Bunnie Huang, with some assistance from the fine folks at PCH International.
DSC_0180 by Tom Igoe

More than just a tour, this was also a tiny conference of open source and physical computing hardware hackers.

The participants were (from left to right above): Jeevan Kalanithi, Eric Schweikardt, Bunnie Huang, Nathan Seidle, Leah Buechley, myself (Windell Oskay), Tom Igoe, and David Merrill.

(Thanks to Tom Igoe for the photo. Thanks also to Dale Dougherty for helping to get such a great set of folks in contact for the trip!)

Shenzhen is a vibrant, bustling, young, and modern city of 8 million in southern China. Just across the border from Hong Kong, Shenzhen and the region around it comprise one of the most active and important manufacturing centers in the world today. (Hint: “made in China” sounds familiar.) The city itself is filled with people, restaurants, smog and shiny skyscrapers. At night freakishly large LED billboards illuminate the sides of apartment buildings and animated RGB neon displays ripple above nightclubs and bars. With a few more flying cars, it might do a good impression of Blade Runner‘s Los Angeles.

IMG_8551

For me personally, one of the most interesting parts of this trip was spending some time in the vast electronic markets of downtown Shenzhen. The building pictured above, the SEG Electronic Market, is a focal point in the markets. Bunnie wrote quite a bit about this place two years ago (and it’s all true).

Continue reading A visit to the electronics markets of Shenzhen →

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Neighborhood Holiday Parade

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Lakewood neighborhood holiday parade




Yesterday was the Lakewood Neighborhood Holiday Parade, and this was our second year watching it. It is a charming tradition: the middle and high school bands march together and play holiday music, all the local classic cars come out (some of them bearing local politicians), and they host a toy drive. It was bright and sunny and all the classic cars shone. For more pictures (from both this year and last) you can check out my flickr set.




Lakewood neighborhood holiday parade

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The Sashimi Tabernacle Choir (on the Smithsonian Channel)

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The Sashimi Tabernacle Choir

The Smithsonian Channel’s series America Wild & Wacky is featuring ArtCar Fest. In a blog post about the episode, they linked to my flickr video from Maker Faire of the Sashimi Tabernacle Choir. Here for your entertainment is my clip of hundreds of computer controlled singing sea creatures performing Bohemian Rhapsody.

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No Refills?

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Maker Faire Austin

On our way to Maker Faire Austin, we grabbed a bite to eat at the San Jose airport, where we saw this rather confusing sign on a soda machine:
“NO REFILLS–Refills Available For .59¢”
So which is it, refills or no refills? And do they really make change for a penny?

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Maker Faire Austin Pictures

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lovely sign for the show barn

We had a wonderful time at Maker Faire Austin. I’ve put some pictures and videos up in this flickr set for your enjoyment.

Electrified Monopoly   Maker Faire Austin

Our neighbors at Maker Faire were Kris and Carly who were doing very fun things with LEDs, like making Monopoly more fun by lighting up when you land on certain squares. The no-solder wiring system was very clever, and the flashing blue and red lights in jail were perfect.

Maker Faire Austin   It's the gnomes that make it perfect

This cute little robotics platform stopped by for a visit, but in order to see most of the rest of the faire we had to pry ourselves away from our table, which was tough. There was a nice collection of art cars, including this Chia Car. Maker Faire is wonderfully overwhelming, and we didn’t take very many pictures. Luckily, many other people took pictures too, and you can check lots of them out on flickr.

 

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A Visit to Sturgeon’s Mill, a Steam-powered Lumber Mill

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Sturgeon's MillSturgeon’s Mill is a steam-powered sawmill in northern California. I had the privilege of seeing it running recently. The next demonstration dates are Sept 20 & 21 and Oct 18 & 19. If you have any cause to be near Sebastopol, California on those dates, I highly recommend a visit.
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