EE Bookshelf: The Balance Filter

  Writing a basic I2C or SPI driver for your sensor is only 1/2 the work (often less!).  All of the real magic is doing something with that sensor data, and that often means getting your hands dirty with some basic DSP (digital signal processing).  I stumbled across this paper on filtering sensor data to

Terry Wohlers fears U.S. losing its edge in additive manufacturing #3dthursday

Terry Wohlers fears U.S. losing its edge in additive manufacturing, from 3ders.org: Terry Wohlers, an industry consultant, analyst, and speaker, president of independent consulting firm Wohlers Associates, provided some impressive insights into the market of Additive Manufacturing during their preparation for the publication of Wohlers Report 2013. He revealed some interesting data: œ16 companies in

Quentin Harley released SCARA based “RepRap Morgan” 3D printer and its design #3dthursday

Quentin Harley released SCARA based œRepRap Morgan� 3D printer and its design, via 3ders: Reprap Morgan is a concentric dual arm SCARA FDM 3D printer, designed and built by Quentin Harley. The SCARA stands for Selective Compliant Assembly Robot Arm or Selective Compliant Articulated Robot Arm. Harley has been working on this project for a

Sculptor and Mathematician Join Forces to Create World’s First Entirely 3D Printed Mobiles #3dthursday

Sculptor Marco Mahler and mathematician Henry Segerman have joined forces to bring a very special and dynamic form of mathematical sculptures to the world of 3D printing ” the world™s first entirely 3D printed mobiles! These 3D printed mobiles are the result of a collaboration between Marco Mahler, a kinetic sculptor specializing in mobiles, and

Forme Offers Fantastic Scanned 3D Models of Natural Objects #3dthursday

As the number of 3D parts repositories have been increasing tremendously in recent days as desktop 3D printing enthusiasts and 3D artists hunger for new sources for models to print out and manipulate based on interests, brand loyalty (or frustration), and opportunities to using versioning tools to track part changes, a handful of specialty sites

Dr. Mishra Wins Competitve NSF Grant to Support Funding to Help 3D Printers ˜Learn™ #3dthursday

Dr. Mishra Wins Competitve NSF Grant to Support Funding to Help 3D Printers ˜Learn™, via Metal Powder Report. Dr. Sandipan Mishra, a professor at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, has won a five-year US$400,000 grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF) to improve the additive manufacturing (AM) process. Dr Mishra, who works in the Department of Mechanical,

The audacious plan to end hunger with 3-D printed food #3dthursday

The audacious plan to end hunger with 3-D printed food, from Quartz: Anjan Contractor™s 3D food printer might evoke visions of the œreplicator� popularized in Star Trek, from which Captain Picard was constantly interrupting himself to order tea. And indeed Contractor™s company, Systems & Materials Research Corporation, just got a six month, $125,000 grant from NASA to create

Updated Tutorial: Adafruit Color Sensors – Use it with Processing!

Use it with Processing! “ Adafruit Color Sensors @ The Adafruit Learning System. The Adafruit_TCS34725 Library includes a processing sketch to communicate with the ColorView Arduino sketch and display color on your computer screen in real time. RGB Color Sensor with IR filter “ TCS34725. Flora Color Sensor “ TCS34725.

The Adafruit RFID Breakout Board Wand for MakerBot by Miax #3dthursday

Check out the latest 3D printed project with embedded electronics from Kris Kortright ” one of my favorites of his to date! (And a great demonstration for using Blender to creating electronics projects.) You can find it at Thingiverse Thing 91160: This is a wand/protector for the Adafruit RFID Breakout Board that I™m using in

Printing Large Scale Solar Cells

From The Register: One of the big problems in the world of printed solar cells is scale: it™s much easier to print a cell the size of a fingernail than one of useful size. Australia™s Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) believes a process announced last week changes all that.

BIOSTAGOG #3d

Platige Image and Bridge created BIOSTAGOG “ an interactive sculpture which combines algorithmic design, 3D printing, mapping and interaction. This parametrically generated, multicellular form has been integrated with projection and by that it gives a possibility of interaction between installation and its audience. BIOSTAGOG can display creative content made by artists working at Platige Image

HP 82929A “ Programmable ROM Drawer Clone

œGiven that the HP 829292A is one of the hard to find accessories to for the HP Series 80 and it™s a must have if you don™t have some of the original expansion ROMs such as the Assembler ROM, the primary goal of this project is to design and build a functional clone of the

Anti-Tetris project is a study in hand tracking

The game of Anti-Tetris is played by standing in front of a monitor and watch falling Tetris pieces overlaid on a video image of your body. Each hand is used to make pieces disappear so that they don™t stack up to the top of the screen. We don™t see this as the next big indie game. What we do see ¦ Read the rest

Ask Hackaday: What are we going to do with the new Kinect?

Yesterday Microsoft announced their new cable box, the Xbox One. Included in the announcement is a vastly improved Kinect sensor. It won™t be available until next Christmas, but now the question is what are we going to do with it?

From what initial specs that can be found, the new version of the Kinect will output RGB 1080p video over ¦ Read the rest

NEW PRODUCT – Right Angle USB cable

NEW PRODUCT “ Right Angle USB cable “ A/MicroB “ This here is your standard A to micro-B USB cable, for USB 1.1 or 2.0, but with a twist! Literally! Instead of the cable coming straight out from the connector, there™s a right angle bend. We thought this might make a good pair for a

Etching Flex Circuits #WearableWednesday

Mika @ Kobakant writes: You can design, print and etch your own PCBs from a flexible sheet of Kapton coated with a thin layer of copper. To do this yourself you need some special materials and equipment, and if you are not planning on etching circuits more regularly then it can be nice to start

Developing Spray-On Fabric #WearableWednesday

Fabrican™s long road to commercialization on Core77: Don™t get us wrong, Fabrican is amazing. But it is not new, and serves as a reminder of just how long it can take to bring a good idea to market, and how dogged inventors need to be. Manel Torres first conceived of Fabrican way back in 1995,

Robolamp can see you now #showandtell #adafruit6secs

Check out Robolamp can see you now by Rick a short 6 second film for the Adafruit #adafruit6secs electronic film festival (Youtube playlist here for all the entries on YouTube).

Remote Controled Rubberband Gun

Haven't you ever wanted to be able to press a button to ward away unwanted intruders? Well now you can with just a few  simple steps, but first you'll need some supplies. You will need: - An Arduino board (any model should work) - A rubber band gun (I just made one out of some wood scraps and a clo...By: powellcubsContinue Reading »

Morse code generator for the 16x24 HT1632C LED Matrix- I made it at TechShop

In this instructable I'll detail how to use the HT1642C LED Matrix from Adafruit to make a Morse code generator that both flashes a letter and plays a buzzer corresponding to the Morse code equivalent. To make the box for the matrix, take a look at my previous instructable. Here's a video demonstr...By: khietmanContinue Reading »

Playing A Human Theremin

Graphic designer Lucy Sansom turned her sister into a human theremin and then made this video demonstrating how she is played!

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Synthetic Biology for Makers

John Cumbers and a team of synthetic biologists are offering a one-day course on the subject in San Francisco. The course is aimed at makers and programmers, and designed to give a comprehensive introduction into synthetic biology. Last week, I learned that we're much closer to DIY synthetic biology than many of us realize. This course should be a good primer.

Toys Made From Salvaged Flip-flops in Kenya

These whimsical toy animals are the work of the Ocean Sole flip-flop recycling company in Nairobi. The toys they make are created from old flip-flops and other debris that has washed up on the beaches in Kenya.

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Maker Pro: How Much Should I Charge?

Figuring out how much to charge for your product is the second most common question entrepreneurs ask themselves. The first is of course..."what should I build in the first place.� Assuming you™ve made it past the first question and there is a market for your product, you have to figure out how to price your product. I reached out to several entrepreneurs for real world examples you can use for your hardware startup.

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Is it a Hackerspace, Makerspace, TechShop, or FabLab?

The past decade has seen the sudden, dramatic appearance of community spaces offering public, shared access to high-end manufacturing equipment. These spaces are interchangeably referred to as hackerspaces, makerspaces, TechShops, and FabLabs. This can lead the intended audience to become incredibly confused as to why there might be so many names for a single concept. I'd like to take some time to untangle the mess, explain the concepts behind each title, and talk about why I now make significant distinctions between all of these types of spaces.

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