ENOUGH!

Too many posts with no pictures! I OWE IT TO THE WORLD to share images of my stupid projects!

So here's one for you...

THE INVISI-RAY

On Tuesday, we at All Hands Active got our shiny new bylaws ratified (provisionally), then elected our Board of Directors, of which I'm one! To celebrate, I grabbed an old Energizer headlamp I'd been using as a bike light until it started corroding, and swapped out the white LEDs for IR ones. (This is the next step on my journey toward becoming a cyborg with augmented senses.)

Science Materials!

I found four of them in this box, three of which worked, which was just swell. They look pretty much the same as white LEDs...

yeah they look basically the same

The difference is that it's a lot harder to tell whether IR ones are on or off. I tested them with some button batteries and Roxanne's infrared eye. (Roxanne is a wheeled tower housing a CPU, a pair of speakers, a keyboard, a handheld mouse, an LCD monitor, a regular webcam, and an IR one. She stays logged into AHA's IRC channel and - when set up - takes a picture of the space every 30 seconds. She is our assistant and protector; she has a glorious future yet to come.)

This light is invisible to the unaided human eye.

I took out the three screws on the back of the case and set them aside. The back popped off very easily, and while the soldering iron warmed up, I took a spare LED and tested the white LEDs' connections to see which way they were hooked up, with the lamp switch on.

LED, as you probably know, stands for "Light-Emitting Diode". A diode is a component that allows current to pass through it one way, but not the other. So I had to hook up the LEDs in the right direction, or else they simply wouldn't turn on. With new LEDs, the positive leg is almost always cut longer than the negative one, but on a circuit board the leads have usually been cut close to the board. As it turned out, this headlamp had the white LEDs hooked up with the positive legs to the outside.

My IR LEDs were conveniently sized the same as the old white ones, so with some careful bending, they fit right back in the proper holes. (The middle one there shines red when the switch is moved in the opposite direction - like darkroom lamps, very convenient when one is standing in the dark for extended periods.)

The transformation complete, I put the housing back together and tested it. Here's what it looks like, switched off:

And switched on:

And switched on, through an IR camera:

Maahhhvelous! I got a bunch of purple-hued portraits of AHA! people (yay for locking people in dark bathrooms!), then documented the Zombie Walk a few days later. Results are here! A few samples:

Jacob Huge Beard displays the usual desaturation of black dyes.

Epic zombie dude's makeup is largely transparent, revealing the white base mask underneath.

Pokey's Gary Wilson lipstick is also invisible.

An advantage to shooting with invisible light: you can shine it right in people's eyes (for limited periods of time, of course).

Once more, the rest of the photos are available for browsin' on the Facebooks.

Ignite!

Right now (or very soon), I'm presenting at the fourth Ignite (Ann Arbor). I'm probably nervous, so if you see this, please shout "FACE!" at me. It'll make me laugh, and that is always good. If you're not here, text me when you see me come on the live stream linked above! If lots of people do this, you may be able to see me twitch with shock :D

I've got the Ataritar with me onstage; it's the shiny black guitar-thing that isn't a guitar. (If you want details, scroll down!) The Angry Amp is also up here. I've also got the jankiest plug console that was ever janked together the night before a presentation, because I need to plug the Ataritar, a piezo, and my iPod into the Amp at different points. Grunge-tastic!

Should you wish to explore the diagrams later, you can download a PDF of my presentation here (I believe this dropbox will expire in 30 days).

And if you enjoyed this talk, you should heed my words and come to All Hands Active, the hackerspace located in Digital Ops on Liberty. Several of our own have given Ignite talks in the past, including (Matt) Oishi, Xander Honkala, Bilal Ghalib, and Anthony Oliver. You'll also be able to meet Pokey, whose tongue and ears can be seen in the presentation. Awesome people; awesome times.

Ataritar - Part I

So!

The Good People of AHA! went to Maker Faire Detroit. There were many misadventures along the way, but we got there, and I got to show people the cyborg juggling machine, Skate-Tar, goggles, Angry Amp, and (sorta) LED rope dart. Then, Mitch Altman and Jimmie Rodgers came to visit us, along with Matt Mets, MAKE's resident blogger and all-around excellent fellow. (Mitch and Jimmie were also awesome!) The night before their soldering workshop, we got together for beers at Grizzly Peak, a jam session including the unholy marriage of Skate-Tar and Jimmie's Atari Punk Console, and a photo battle.

Since then, some of us have been working on Roxanne, our beautiful all-in-one makerspace monitor/memory; I'm going to build her ears and pharynx. And she will come with us to the NYC Global Maker Faire in September. But my main project for now is the ATARITAR!

Atari Punk Console (APC), speaker replaced with 1/8" plug

Jimmie brought these into the space for the workshop; it's an audio tone generator, controlled by two potentiometers. I wanted one, but didn't want to buy a full kit, so I was going to order just the PCB... and then I discovered an unfinished one, consigned to a lonely drawer long ago. Goodtiems!

The APC is going to be mounted onto a stripped-down electric guitar body; the strings, tuning hardware, and pickups were removed some time ago. Here, you can see the back of the pickguard, which has a 1/4" mono jack, 2 pots (Volume and Tone), and two switches (for the absent pickups). I've replaced the wiring to one of the switches with a 1/8" jack, so that I can plug the APC in where a pickup would go, and at this point a 1/4" jack can run from the pickguard to my Angry Amp (not pictured). This allows me to run the APC through the guitar hardware to the amp. I hooked up a 1/4" jack to the other switch; in the picture above, the APC and Skate-Tar are both plugged into the guitar 'ware, running through to the amp. Interesting noises!

Next, I needed to cut down the pickguard to accommodate the addition of buttons and switches (being too lazy to drill holes). This was accomplished with wire cutters, tin snips, and a rasp. (A Dremel would've been much faster, but I was too lazy to get it out.)

I also added some hackerspace stickers; these are from Pumping Station: One and OmniCorp Detroit.

And some other things, including a button from kwartzlab (Ontario-place) and patch from the MakerCity Faire.

Finished pickguard! The silver Sharpie is just a fancy way to demarcate the "on" positions for the switches.

The next step was to make the APC a permanent attachment to the 'tar. I removed the 1/8" plug and extended wires between the pots and PCB. However, these weakened connections caused the sound to turn into horrible, high, dolphin-like noises. As I'm going for a more bass effect, this was not the proper direction for things to be going.

With much trepidation, I got the pots back onto the PCB, and it sounded good again.

At this point, I took a break from soldering to enhance the aesthetic qualities of the instrument. I took the stickers off (having multiples), and used this paint that I found in my room while searching for a plastic bag... serendipity! (Paint originally from the excellent David Lamb.)

Applied the paint in the women's bathroom at Digital Ops (the whale to AHA's remora, also the oldest multiplayer gaming facility in North America). This tends to be the place where we contain noxious fumes, loud noises, flying sparks, and so on...

Before!

After!

The paint is beautiful and glossy, just as promised. I put on threeish coats and a touch-up layer.

And my AHA! name :)

Thus concludes Part I of the Ataritar Saga! Since these pictures were taken, I've managed to integrate the APC fully into the guitar body and added magnets and such. The next installment will contain an update on whatever variable resistor I manage to scrounge together.

Exciting! :D

Musical Cyborg Juggling Apparatus

6 1/2 hours in the AHA! Shop and a chocolate-peanut-butter sandwich brought us to this. I'd been stalled out on the method for weeks, and then the clouds suddenly broke, early on April Fool's Day.

So what is this? It is a harness that turns the action of juggling into buzzing noises, flashing LEDs, and arcing electricity. Each palm has two separate copper wires exposed, one of which is hooked up to the positive terminal of a battery, while the other connects to a motor (or bank of LEDs, or people-shocking device). When the wires are bridged by a tinfoil-covered juggling ball, the circuit is closed and the motor (people-shocker, eye-blinder, etc.) runs. Thus, the juggling becomes a method of switching things on and off... like so:

...ish.

And this is what it actually looks like... somewhat less elegant, perhaps. At the top left, we have the left glove with a conductive ball bridging its contacts; below that, a taped-up 12V battery pack (the brown/blue block); then, the box itself. Most of the apparatus is externally mounted. Magnets glued near the four central motors anchor metal bolts, which are struck by the spinning zip ties to create a variety of buzzing sounds (sample mp3!). From the bottom left emerge wires from a shocker, which discharges a decent amount of voltage (I forget how much) across the blue and white wires' stripped ends. It will arc up to about 1cm through the air, which looks pretty sweet, and also give you a pretty hefty shock. (Me holding one contact + Amanda holding the other + proximity -> lightning hands!)

Not pictured: burned-out LED bank... I am not yet wise in the science of adding resistors. But a new, more awesome version is on the way.

The box belts to my waist, and...

suede straps anchor the wires to my arms.

Prototype glove... wire contacts wrapped around a scrap anchor on the inside. Jabby.

Suede glove #1 in production!

Maille rings and thread hold the wires in place. Juggling gloves: now with 50% less pain!


Balls: socks + washers (for heft) + duct tape (for cushioning and adhesive) + tinfoil.

So, there is currently a glove for each hand, plus these:
Finger-contacts! These copper rings are a pain, both figuratively (the donning/doffing process is tedious) and literally (they have a tendency to channel voltage straight through my fingers, resulting in anguish and blisters). But they look... kinda awesome.

I brought this machine to exhibit (with AHA!) at TEDxUofM, which was pretty stupendous. My favorite presenters were John Holland, Udae Sandhu (who voiced basically my current philosophy of happiness), Jacob Mendel's "Zlatá Rybka" video, Mason Proper (!!), Matt Shlian, and Alex Wand (with his awesome marimba-bowing musics). Yesssssss.

AHA! and the Apparatus will also be making an appearance at several future DIY/tech/Maker events, including the Hands-On Museum's Tech Event (May 22), the Ann Arbor Mini Maker Faire (June 5), and hopefully the Detroit Maker Faire (July 31 - August 1). Actually, this post is part of my application for Detroit... I anticipate all three being fantastic.

(Do Breadboards Dream Of) Electric Jam

IT LIVES!


Last Saturday, I finished Make's crackerbox amp project. This is extremely exciting, as it represents a) a successful first foray into the twin lands of circuit diagrams and building electronics from scratch, and b) the actualization of my own electric mandolin!

Janky janky janky. But it works! (I had very limited wire resources... hence, everything is the same color.)

This soldering job reminds me of Kate Beaton's fat pony: ugly and incompetent, but kind of endearing...

While Make seems to have some kind of sponsorship thing with Radio Shack, I don't recommend going there for parts. I moseyed down there one evening, and walked out feeling like I'd lost two hours (including bus time) and spent twice as much as I should've for the components I got. Even if you go online to avoid getting ripped off as much, it could easily cost more than $5 if you don't have most of the stuff already on hand. Still, no complaints - I ended up with this...

:)

The best reference material came from http://www.kpsec.freeuk.com/ . Amazing resource for semi-newcomers to the field of electronic jiggery-pokery. I also highly recommend checking out cairn's comments / linked PCB layout pic on the article page. While it was fun to slowly learn how to read the circuit diagram, at times it got extremely frustrating; I found that layout diagram once I was done, and kinda wished I'd had it all along. (Still, it was gratifying to turn the thing on and have noise come out, when I'd wondered if it would do anything but set the carpet on fire.)

With the piezo mounted! I tried poking/cutting holes in the speaker cone for more distortion, but it doesn't seem to make much of a difference... perhaps because I only have an 8-ohm speaker. It came from the local Kiwanis rummage sale - they have a bunch, and I paid a solitary buck for this one.

This amp exists mainly to give grittiness and edge to the mandolin, and that it does, most noticeably in the upper registers. I chose to use surface-mounted pickups because there's no way I'm taking a drill to the mandolin. So I'm going with a piezo wired to a 1/4" plug, courtesy of the excellent Matt Endahl.

Next step: build a case for it. I settled on some 2-walled plastic with linear cells, which David and I pulled out of the art museum dumpster a while back.

Piezo pickup with plug, duct tape, box cutter, Sharpie, nail sink, amp, plastic.

Cut the plastic into three panels, for optimal stability (that whole 3-legs-don't-wobble thing)... plus mega style points.

Top and bottom covers (the top flaps open); speaker hole cutout.

Duct tape "hammer" + nail sink + needlenose pliers -> easy holes, exactly the right size.

Loud = volume, Angry = gain :)

A lot of people asked about volume vs. gain. As I understand it, the chip already amplifies input sound by a certain amount. The gain feeds from the chip back into it, so that basically controls how much the chip amplifies the signal (sound). (Past a certain level, this creates clipping, which makes it sound gritty.) The volume is between the chip and the speaker ("after" the chip), so it controls how much of this already-amplified signal is put through the speaker.

Left side: on/off toggle, 1/4" jack
Center: volume rheostat, gain potentiometer
Right: speaker
Bottom: PCB, 9V battery

Finished! Here's a short sound sample with the mandolin. There are some images up already on Facebook, as I brought it to Build Night last night at AHA...

Rocking out (as best I am able) at the shop.

We also taped it up to the illustrious Amanda's amazing propane tank steel drum. That thing sounds amazing, though as with the mandolin, only the higher registers worked with the amp's distortion. Apparently, I can switch out one of the capacitors, and it'll pick up more bass... so I guess that's a logical next step with this thing. I already tried hooking up some red LEDs inline with the speaker (so they'd pulse along with the sound), but alas, they were too much of a voltage drain and barely any sound came out.

The last couple of photos are from AHA's Facebook page; I believe they were taken by Josh, one of the proprietors of Digital Ops, our venue. I am inexpressibly happy that this space, the group, and the people in it exist. Dudes are seriously awesome.

Oh. Yes. That.

What? Hmm? You've noticed my flash drive looks a little strange?

Rather like a ray gun, perhaps?

Perhaps.

I'd toyed with the idea of making some steampunk goggles, but for several reasons dragged my feet. A, they're overdone, B, I don't do plastic but hunks of metal + face = cumbersome, and C, I couldn't immediately come up with a solution for the lenses. (Again, I don't do plastic.) But I wanted another project. And then one night I was sitting around, and I realized what I must do with those clock gears I've had laying around my bedroom.

It's time to build a ray gun.

This will be a secondary blaster, mounted above a larger one and set back a little. I'm currently thinking of making TWO guns, because I have too much excellent stuff to fit on one. I have:
• Clock gears/sprockets
• Burgundy and black suede for the grips (only one grip color for each gun)
• A small purple glass flute vase for a barrel (with ray-shooter mounted inside)
• A double-lensed jeweler's loupe
• Two frightening-looking needles (I think they're for injecting marinade into meat... but for me they shall be ray-focusers):

• Ring of ball bearings, clock part for crosshair, random bit of copper, clock part for trigger:

• 5-gigabyte Rio Carbon that largely died a few years back, but still functions well enough to work as a storage drive:
I'm particularly excited about this last element. I reshaped the metal backplate to fit more snugly around the thing's guts, and it will be the crowning bit of geekery inside. I've also changed the settings to keep the backlight on, which will give me some red LEDs to display. I also have a ring of 9 white LEDs, which are lovely and bright, so I can even have it be a flashlight as well. Bwaha. Bwahahaha. Bwa... ha.

(I am very happy that this has inspired my friend Link to make himself a raygunlight for use at the office. Excellent, excellent.)

In other news, I brought my mandolin up to North Campus and recorded a far more strange version of "I'm Not Sorry" (steampunk/speculative folk song), with layers and layers of mandolin. I'm very happy about this, as it has much better vocals. I still trip up a couple of times, but my voice isn't all over the place. I also got to sing with Jess when she performed at Café Verde last Saturday; we did "Sons and Daughters" by the Decemberists, an excellent song and oh so improvisable.

Good times.