NYC Resistor

Devon Jones needed a robot to do his bidding and so he made a computer controlled dremel. He found an instructable by Stuart McFarlan and created it using a mix of aluminum stock, an inexpensive wood called MDF, and skate bearings.

It now works so he’s going to be able to use the subtractive process, which means he can take away all the parts of the material that are not his thing, to create whatever he can imagine.

I’m publishing a video everyday. Catch them all over on my blog.

Today only from 3-5PM you can come to NYCResistor and get your laptop etched for a mere $25.

This is crazy since we normally charge $100, but it’s a slow day here at NYCResistor so we figured, let’s see if we can get people in here to do something awesome. This is an experiment and it’s likely to never happen again.

It probably won’t hurt to bone up over at ladyada’s setting page and read instructable’s etching instructions.

Laser Etching Macintosh Powerbooks. - More cool how to projects

Check out this challenge, it just started yesterday!

I do all of my hacking at the NYC Resistor hacker space, and I’m proud to announce the most recent fruit of my labors: the Sanguino. This board is an Arduino-compatible board that boasts 4x the memory (64K!) 4x the RAM (4K!) and 12 more pins (32 IO pins!) Its all open source and you can get one from the RepRap Research Foundation for only $25. Sweet!

Oh, and I managed to get this footage last night. Check it out.

Sanguino: Arduino’s Big Brother from Zach 'Iowa' Hoeken on Vimeo.

Gian Pablo, maker of this sweet algorithmic synth forces Wall-E to rock out. Gian Pablo has been known to teach synth making classes at NYCR so keep your eyes on the upcoming classes page if you’re interested.

Wall•E and the Rhythmic Synth from Gian Pablo Villamil on Vimeo.

Dino Dai Zovi’s Birthday cake at the NYCResistor Party

Encrypted with Dino’s PGP key to say Happy Birthday

Play or Die

So here’s a quick preview of the LED Array Jacket. I’m pretty excited it’s managed to light. Currently I am redesigning the driver circuit and boarduino to work with non-solid core wiring and to be more elegant and clean. But I thought this might wet your appetites.

Check out this awesome modular robot! It even heals itself when kicked. Crazy!

This weekend will be New York’s first Robotics Competition. It’s going to be held at the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center @ 655 W. 34th St., New York, NY 10001 and will including a bunch of funny looking robots running around kicking soccer balls at each other.

Working in teams, students have just six weeks to create their robot. They get the opportunity to work with programmable radio controls, pneumatics, motors, electrical circuits, mechanics, machining, web design, computer animation, computer assisted design, and other technologies – just like professional engineers and technologists do. Following the six-week design and build phase, teams enter local and regional competitions.

Some of you may have seen my presentation on evolving virtual machines using genetic algorithms at BarCampNYC3. For those who didn’t, Cobosoda is an open-source 2D rigid physics simulator with a set of genetic algorithm tools. The idea is these little creatures evolve into walking machines. Talking with a close friend and Csound expert Jake Joaquin the next step has become clear, add sound and turn Cobosoda into an art project for the resistor space.