Make Magazine
DIY projects, how-tos, and inspiration from geeks, makers, and hackers
Updated: 14 min 52 sec ago
Black Makers Month: Amon Millner
Amon Millner is a member of the Modkit team. I also first met him at Maker Faire in Austin, Texas. He does a lot of cool stuff and his students do really cool stuff, too.
Categories: Makers
Introducing the Maker Pro Newsletter
The mission of the Maker Pro Newsletter is to inform, analyze, educate, and catalyze as we explore emerging opportunities for makers. We're thrilled at what's happening in this arena and want to share the good news as we find it...
Categories: Makers
Teen Launches Hello Kitty into Space
Thirteen-year-old Lauren Rojas' science fair project has taken off in ways she never imagined. The seventh grader at Cornerstone Christian School in Antioch, Calif. saw a Visa commercial that featured three guys sending a balloon into the upper atmosphere. She wanted to do something simliar to test a hypothesis about the effects of altitude on air pressure and air temperature.
"I learned a lot more about space than I ever knew," she said.
She also got an unexpected lesson in internet fame.
Categories: Makers
Gruesome/Awesome Web-Controlled Puppet
Twitr_janus is a live physical avatar — a puppet that can be controlled remotely through Google Drive, Twitter, and Skype. Inside: an Arduino and webcam. Outside: hot glue face (shaped with a silicone latex mold) and paper mache skull (shaped over carved polystyrene).
Categories: Makers
Spring Has Sprung, Because Faire Season Has Begun
Call for Makers are open and active for over 20 Maker Faires around the globe. A good number are being organized by science and children's museums, often in collaboration with local makers or makerspaces. Jerusalem Mini Maker Faire (March 18/19) and Tyler Mini Maker Faire (March 23) are two examples.
Categories: Makers
10 Things To Do When Starting a Fab Lab
Over at openp2pdesign.org, designer Massimo Menichinelli has written up some suggestions for starting a new Fab Lab: …the machines are not the most important feature of lab: instead, it is more about the people behind it. People with a wrong and rigid attitude or without the required knowledge and expertise [...]
Categories: Makers
5, 4, 3, 2, 1 Things About Steve Hoefer
Steve Hoefer is a San Francisco-based inventor and creative problem solver with nearly 20 years of experience. He’s contributed projects to the pages of MAKE, including his Indestructible LED Lanterns, Secret-Knock Gumball Machine, and Haptic Wrist Rangefinder. He’s also active in the open source hardware and software communities and is [...]
Categories: Makers
Barbie’s Blinky Dress
Looks like those years of being a computer engineer have gotten Barbie into soft circuits — this year an available accessory is the Digital Dress.
Categories: Makers
Black Makers Month: Pamela Jennings
OK, it’s tax time and I’m tired. That’s no excuse for not posting more awesome Black Makers to the blog! Especially since it’s tax time and I’m about to give Uncle Sam more of my hard-earned dollars I would be sadly remiss to not get Pamela Jennings up here, since she is like a super-meta maker. Not only does she make her own cool stuff, but she is at the National Science Foundation and helps get other makers in the research world the money that they need to change the world. Awesome, yes? I think so! Pamela is another fantastically talented maker who I first met at Sketching In Hardware. I wish I could direct all my tax dollars to her funding initiatives.
Categories: Makers
LiveBots, Robots Live on the Web
Got a robot on the web? Consider adding it to Livebots.cc, which aggregates UStream feeds from multiple robots that allow visitors to control them through the web. The “hand” robot in the image above was built by the site operator, Navic, who documented instructions on how to build the hand-bot. [...]
Categories: Makers
Love at First Maker
Hear the story of Paula Chang and Mike Cheung, who met at Maker Faire Bay Area and now run a DIY business from their home and garage in Oakland, CA.
Categories: Makers
3D Printing Revolution: the Complex Reality
Affordable and hobbyist-friendly manufacturing tools that convert polygons into physical objects have been available for more than a decade. Although new technologies such as ABS extruders are different in many ways, it’s reasonable to suspect that the prospects of home manufacturing may have relatively little to do with the choice of a particular tool.
Categories: Makers
Two Bay Area Young Maker Events This Weekend
It's my pleasure to tell you about two fantastic Young Makers / Open Make events happening in the San Francisco Bay Area this Saturday, Feb. 16. But be ready for a twinge of disappointment: You'll have to pick just one of these two wonderful ways to spend a Saturday, because they are happening at the same time! Each site is an action-packed flurry of activity that starts at 10am and ends with an inspiring "meet-the-makers" panel discussio
Categories: Makers
Laughing Dice Now Public Domain
It’s official; I hereby release my Laughing Dice into the public domain. Go to town with them.Filed under: Art & Design
Categories: Makers
5, 4, 3, 2, 1 Things About Wendy Tremayne
Photo by Judd Irish Bradley Wendy Tremayne has contributed a number of projects to the pages of MAKE and CRAFT over the years, all under the themes of creative reuse and homesteading. She’s also founder of the Swap-O-Rama-Rama event that combines clothing swap and DIY workshops, and has become a [...]
Categories: Makers
5 Last-Minute Valentine’s Day Gestures
If you waited until the last minute to figure out Valentine's Day, here are five romantic gestures to show your sweetie you care. Suggestion #1? Make a fort!
Categories: Makers
Black Makers Month: Don Stanford
Most people take for granted so much of the technology around us. One man who doesn’t is my neighbor and fellow Brown University faculty member Don Stanford. He is the genius that helped transform a small lottery machine builder into the world’s leading lottery machine manufacturer. No small task, considering how much money is transacted through these devices and considering how totally critical it is that they work all the time and maintain very secure transactions. What happens when a machine goes down? Well, GTECH would pay the owner of the machine for all the lost revenue until the machine is fixed! Just think about this for a second. What if Microsoft or ATT paid you every time your computer crashed or a call was dropped. I bet that would cause a transformational reliability improvement in Microsoft or ATT’s products!!
Categories: Makers
Colossal Mindstorms EV3 Dragon Acts Alive
I love this fantastic dragon built from next-generation Mindstorms EV3 parts, created by the Lego Mindstorms Education EV3 team, including product designer Lee Magpili. You can see more of his work at Lego Education as well as his Flickr set. The dragon, Valentine, was built from 6 EV3 microcontroller bricks, [...]
Categories: Makers
Switches Made Simple
In this video, Collin gives a comprehensive overview of the humble switch, demonstrating switches of the toggle, DIP, slide, rocker, rotary, and momentary variety, and explains the difference between SPST and DPDT switches in the process.
Categories: Makers
Making a Makerspace in Haiti
In the middle of Port au Prince, nestled right between the UN, the airport, and Cite Soleil - Haiti's largest slum - groups of international development workers, volunteers, and Haitian community leaders are working on improving life in Haiti through the Maker ethic. Founded immediately after the 2010 earthquake, Haiti Communitere has been on the ground for the past three years, serving as a community, networking and shared-overhead space for both international NGOs and Haitian groups. Their current focus is on developing their Resource Center, a community workshop, computer lab, and conference space that serves as Haiti's only makerspace.
Categories: Makers