Tools Hack Daily: May 2022

Tuesday, May 31, 2022

The Beauty of Arcades #ArtTuesday

Although there aren’t as many arcades as there used to be, they’re still fun and beautiful. Franck Bohbot’s Back To The Arcade captures this.

via CreativeBoom

As a subject, arcades are uniquely fascinating. Thanks to advances in technology and changing lifestyles, we have been able to see their life and death come and go in the space of a few years. It is further underlined by their presence in movies from the Eighties, an era that has recently made a comeback thanks to nostalgic programmes like Stranger Things being set in that period.

Every Tuesday is Art Tuesday here at Adafruit! Today we celebrate artists and makers from around the world who are designing innovative and creative works using technology, science, electronics and more. You can start your own career as an artist today with Adafruit’s conductive paints, art-related electronics kits, LEDs, wearables, 3D printers and more! Make your most imaginative designs come to life with our helpful tutorials from the Adafruit Learning System. And don’t forget to check in every Art Tuesday for more artistic inspiration here on the Adafruit Blog!

Game Boy as Wall Art #ArtTuesday

Even the president of the united states thinks we should have a right to repair. And if we have a right to repair, we should also have the right to deconstruct our handhelds and turn them into wall art. Here’s more from Kotaku:

Having a shelf filled with older portable video game systems is nice and all, but there’s so much more to a Game Boy Color than you can see. The boards and buttons and bits and bobs that make up the inside are every bit as impressive and important as the plastic shell. Grid Studio’s pieces celebrate the inner and outer beauty of beloved electronics in a way I couldn’t resist.

Grid takes actual gaming hardware, from the Game Boy to the Nintendo DS, disassembles it, and mounts the individual parts on a board that’s printed with labels explaining what function the components perform. The Game Boy Color model, currently awaiting hanging in my new home, highlights the system’s speakers, inputs, buttons, and even the rubber bits beneath that make the buttons so soft and spongy.

See more!

Three Tons of Waste Pour From a Spigot #ArtTuesday

Where does trash go? That is the theme of this beautiful and haunting sculpture from Benjamin Von Wong. Here’s more from COLOSSAL:

To coincide with the United Nations Environment Assembly meeting, photographer and artist Benjamin Von Wong erected a towering, 30-foot installation outside U.N. headquarters in Kenya. With the help of the Human Need s Project, an NGO providing basic services to slums around the world, Vong Wong collaborated with more than 100 residents of the large, poverty-stricken region of Nairobi known as Kibera. Together, they gathered, sanitized, and strung up three tons of water bottles, condiment containers, and other unwanted items that were then suspended from the oversized silver spigot.

Although it shows a minuscule portion of the waste produced worldwide, the resulting installation, titled “Turn Off the Plastic Tap,” is a powerful indictment of consumerism and the lack of environmental protections. “Too much of the plastic conversation revolves around recycling and cleanups, but those only deal with the consequences, and not the root cause,” Von Wong writes. “The real solution and opportunity is getting plastic production back under control by making sure we turn off the plastic tap.”

See more!

The World of Tomás Saraceno’s Art Installations #ArtTuesday

The world of art is turning into more and more of a world, as immersive concepts take the fore. Installation art has been a part of the art world for a very long time, but over the last decade or so the distinction between immersive theater, art, and art installations has been blurred more and more. The work of Tomás Saraceno is part of this direction, currently on display in a 17,000 space in New York City. Here’s more from ArtNet:

Ever wondered what it would be like to live the life of a spider? For eight minutes at a time, visitors to the Shed in Manhattan can climb onto a giant trapeze-like installation that simulates the vibrations of a spider spinning its web underneath you. A soundtrack plays in the background featuring the amplified sounds of spiders communicating with one another and moving in their surroundings.

The experience is the main feature of “Tomás Saraceno: Particular Matter(s),” the artist and activist’s largest U.S.-based exhibition, on view through April 17. The installation, commissioned by the Shed and titled Free the Air: How to hear the universe in a spider/web, extends across the entire 17,000-square-foot McCourt space, with other works by the artist taking over the second- and fourth-level galleries.

Learn more!

Monday, May 30, 2022

Creating a Petabyte HD Array Controlled by a Single Raspberry Pi

Well here’s a Pi project you thought you’d never see. Jeff Geerling created a storage array of 60 20TB hard drives, aka over a petabyte, controlled by a Raspberry Pi 4.

It was just an experiment to see if the Pi had what it took (and to have an excuse to use one of 45Drive’s Storinator XL 60-bay server).

So, did it work? Sorta. Kinda. At least in a proof-of-concept sort of way.

Saturday, May 28, 2022

The Great Blanton Bake-Off

The Blanton Museum of Art in Austin Texas holds a yearly contest where bakers recreate works of art.

Established in 2020, the #BlantonBakeOff is a fun annual contest providing art lovers with the opportunity to recreate their favorite works of art inspired by works from the Blanton Museum of Art’s collection! The public chooses their favorites in a social media vote on World Baking Day (May 17), with prizes for the winners provided by some of our favorite bakeries in Austin, Texas. Learn more about how the contest began via PBS Newshour.

Friday, May 27, 2022

TherMobile #piday #raspberrypi @Raspberry_Pi

via Irak Mayer on hackster.io

The continuous reminder in the last two years of how important is to know the human body temperature made me think on creating an easy to use, fit-in-your-hand, and mobile device that could give me thermal information of my environment; with this in mind I took myself on a journey to create such a device. This is my story.

First, I start with a thermal camera, and how to display its data. The initial monitor was an RGB matrix, why? you may ask, because they are cool, simple to set apart from all the mess I have on my desk.

Each Friday is PiDay here at Adafruit! Be sure to check out our posts, tutorials and new Raspberry Pi related products. Adafruit has the largest and best selection of Raspberry Pi accessories and all the code & tutorials to get you up and running in no time!

Portable Raspberry Pi Setup #RaspberryPi #PiDay @Raspberry_Pi @ChrisRemboldt

Rad build-in-progress from maker Chris Remboldt on Twitter!

Building a portable #raspberrypi setup with this VERY cool @solderparty
usb keyboard. Combined with #thonny on the Pi Zero 2 W, it’ll be a great portable coding practice rig! Love the BlackBerry keys and mouse, this thing is perfect 🤯

Homebrew Computer @Raspberry_Pi #PiDay #RaspberryPi

Here’s a fun project with a wonderful aesthetic. It’s a homebrew Raspberry Pi by way of a Terry Gilliam production design. Here’s more from Geoalx2 via hackster.io:

This project consist of an assembler project written in Python in order to translate the assembly code into machine code recognizable from the 8085 microprocessor, acustom EEPROM writer using Raspberry Pi pico and microPython, custom Arduino script to send ASCII codes to the CPU using the laptop keyboard and the PC construction itself.

See project!

MagInkCal #piday #raspberrypi @Raspberry_Pi

Build your own MagInkCal with the code provided by speedyg0nz on GitHub:

This repo contains the code needed to drive an E-Ink Magic Calendar that uses a battery powered (PiSugar2) Raspberry Pi Zero WH to retrieve events from a Google Calendar, format it into the desired layout, before pushing it to a Waveshare 12.48″ tri-color E-Ink display.

How To Track All Devices with Raspberry Pi @Raspberry_Pi #PiDay #RaspberryPi

Here’s a project that will provide tracking for your devices with Raspberry Pi. Here’s more from James Carton via hackster.io:

Using a Raspberry Pi, keep track of your phone, tablet, laptop, and other wireless devices! The more Raspberry Pis you have, the better you’ll be able to monitor your house for gadget movement. Send the data from all the Pi’s to an IoT platform to record and visualize your home as well as the positions of all your wireless gadgets!

See project!

OpenMower – The affordable Open Source DIY Smart GPS Robotic Mower @Raspberry_Pi #PiDay #RaspberryPi

Rad build from Clemens Elflein on YouTube – just in time for summer.

The Open Mower project allows you to build your own smart lawn mower robot using the Raspberry Pi and an Arduino. The robot is able to localize itself using very precise RTK GPS. As base for this project, an off-the-shelf robot mower is used. The electric components and the software are published as an open source project.

Via Raspberry Pi

Wednesday, May 25, 2022

Power MacPi #3DThursday #3DPrinting

The_Craft_Dude shares:

after almost a whole year, I have finally managed to finish this raspberry pi case!
The case supports both the pi 3 and pi 4, but I have only made an io shield for the pi 3, since I really couldn’t find any pi 4 STLs as an templete.

download the files on: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:3895747

Every Thursday is #3dthursday here at Adafruit! The DIY 3D printing community has passion and dedication for making solid objects from digital models. Recently, we have noticed electronics projects integrated with 3D printed enclosures, brackets, and sculptures, so each Thursday we celebrate and highlight these bold pioneers!

Have you considered building a 3D project around an Arduino or other microcontroller? How about printing a bracket to mount your Raspberry Pi to the back of your HD monitor? And don’t forget the countless LED projects that are possible when you are modeling your projects in 3D!

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Shop for parts to build your own DIY projects http://adafru.it/3dprinting

3D Printing Projects Playlist:

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Timelapse Tuesday Playlist:

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Noe’s Twitter / Instagram: http://instagram.com/ecken

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HackSpace Magazine Issue 55: Build a Plotter – now out @HackSpaceMag @Raspberry_Pi

HackSpace Magazine Issue 55 – Build a Plotter

There’s a huge range of computer-controlled machines used by makers – 3D printers, laser cutters, CNC mills and more – but the plotter is the easiest to make. This makes it a great build for getting started in the world of computer-controlled machines. For around £15 you can create your own drawing machine with our guide

Learn how hydraulics work

All you need to know about lubrication

Make your own Guitar-Hero style controller

And much more

Get a free Raspberry Pi Pico board with a new 12 month subscription.

NEW GUIDE: Traffic Light Conference Badge #AdafruitLearningSystem @Adafruit @BlitzCityDIY

A new guide today in the Adafruit Learning System: Traffic Light Conference Badge

When you’re out and about at a convention or conference sometimes you want to be a social butterfly, but other times you’d prefer to float anonymously amongst the crowds. In this project, you’ll build a conference badge utilizing a tiny traffic light that you can use to symbolize to the world your socializing preferences in the moment.

This project will show you how to use light_sleep in CircuitPython on the QT Py ESP32-S2 to conserve battery life and give you some ideas for using paint and diorama supplies to add detail to your 3D prints.

See this guide now >>>

A Commodore 64 Raspberry Pi Pico emulator @Raspberry_Pi @kvance

Kevin Vance realizes his wish to design a Commodore 64 ram expansion cartridge using a Raspberry Pi Pico. The Pico presents a window into it’s own RAM and signals are buffered by level shifters. The magic is in the programming to get the Pico’s PIO and DMA to provide the data before the Commodore 64 expects it. Pico’s PIO system provided the biggest advantage for this build, allowing him to keep all the complexity off the CPU and run with predictable timing.

Using a second Pico as an emulator helped with the development process

See more from the creator Kevin on GitHub and also in the Raspberry Pi News.

3D Hangouts Today with @ecken @videopixil

Hey folks, we’re doing this today. Hope to see ya’ll in the Discord chat!

Livestream starts at 11am today, Wednesday May 25 2022

3D Hangouts – Lego Tripod, Mini TFTs and Retro VGA Cables

This week @adafruit we’re 3D printing Lego compatible tripods adapters for mobile phones! Learn how to use your mobile phone’s camera as a webcam. Prototyping a mini TV set with a Feather RP2040 and updates to the mini nintendo switch / steam deck. Timelapse this week featuring retro VGA cable shells for USB-C cables, tubular!

Learn Guide –
https://learn.adafruit.com/lego-phone-holder/

YouTube Video
https://youtu.be/uvmoAoaQeD0

Timelapse Tuesday

VGA to USB C Shell – Jesse Banks
https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:5379323
https://youtu.be/tZCXmtR8K4A

https://www.printables.com/model/32718-raspberry-pi-hq-camera-case/comments#comment-253730

Spreadsheet for Resin Printer Settings

By way of Donald Bell‘s Maker Update comes this really useful tool.

As someone relatively new to resin printing, I’ve come to realize just how important printer settings are for successful prints. Layer height, exposure time, base exposure time, and light-off times can all impact your print success. And all of these values can be different for different resin brands.

This spreadsheet on Maker Trainer shows the optimal settings for all the common (and not so common) resin brands.

Tuesday, May 24, 2022

Debbie Long Turns RVs Into Vessels of Light #ArtTuesday

Debbie Longs Light ships transport people literally and maybe metaphysically. Inside each RV is a surreal light experience. From Hyperallergic:

Over the past decade, the Taos-based Long has outfitted two vintage RVs with hundreds of cast glass pieces that collect light from the sky via a transparent ceiling. Inside the pristine white chamber of “Willa,” stationed outside the Harwood Museum of Art, viewers lounge in cream-colored beanbag chairs for a one-hour immersive viewing experience (no phones or recording devices are allowed). Clouds pass overhead, light trickles from sunrise to sunset to twilight to moonlight, and every movement of the sky orchestra flickers in the handmade glass pieces. Like many of the most successful Light and Space pieces, “Willa” and her predecessor, a trailer called “Naima,” rely on the simplest of gimmicks: light collection.

See more!

Around the Table: Stories of the Foods We Love #ArtTuesday

Sai Mokhtari takes Gothamist readers behind the scenes of artist-designed tables for the upcoming Around the Table: Stories of the Foods We Love, opening June 4th at the New York Botanical Garden:

“It feels like culturally we’ve separated from our food sources over the last few generations: eating more and more processed, delivered or ready made food, and spending less time growing and preparing our food ourselves,” she said. “I’m excited about a meditation on gardens as a source of food and as an expression of art…”

Le Nid enchanté by François Junod

Wonderful creation from artist and maker François Junod, via YouTube. Hackaday published a piece on Junod and his work last year – check it out to learn more!

Scenec from the North West Walls Festival #ArtTuesday

Images from a street are festival in Belgium. Here’s more from Street Art Bio:

North West Walls is a street art project on the site of the Rock Werchter music festival in Belgium. The project has been curated by Arne Quinze for three years now, a Belgian artist who began his carreer as a graffiti artist in the mid 1980s. This is a highly unusual and impressive project as Arne Quinze set the artists the challenge of painting on towers of shipping containers.

See more!

Hundreds of Melting Ice Figures in Néle Azevedo’s Public Works #ArtTuesday

https://youtu.be/ATjpjiQBWhw

Watch heat at work in the art of Néle Azevedo. Here’s more from COLOSSAL:

Ephemerality has always been at the center of Néle Azevedo’s practice. The Brazilian artist is known globally for “Minimum Monument,” a collection of small ice figures that melt in situ.

First exhibited in Campinas, Brazil, in 2001, the installation, which Azevedo dubs an “urban art action,” has found its way to cities like Paris, Belfast, Lima, and Porto. In each iteration, the artist carves hundreds of 20-centimeter-tall figures seated with their ankles crossed and places them atop outdoor steps and in public spaces. The faceless sculptures drip and pool into small puddles as time passes, which initially was Azevedo’s way of critiquing public monuments and taking “into account the history of the defeated, the anonymous, to bring to light our mortal condition.” The impermanence of the frozen substance directly contrasts the enduring nature of bronze, stone, and other materials typically used for statues and commemorative works.

See more!

Monday, May 23, 2022

Folding A Life Size Dragon Tamer | Origami Time-Lapse #ArtTuesday

Chris Conrad Art shared this video on Youtube!

Folding a 19×19 ft square of unryu paper into a Life-Size Dragon Tamer, designed by me.

This took over a month to fold, plus a ton of time spent designing the model. It was displayed as part of my exhibit “Paper Meditations” at Haverford College.

Special thanks to Ilana Panth for helping me make the square and fold parts of it, and Haverford College’s Student Art Fund for sponsoring this project.

Sunday, May 22, 2022

Using A 3D Printer To Make A Sandwich

Y K shared on YouTube:

Make sandwiches with a 3D printer

This video shows one of the prototype applications of our research called Functgraph.

Functgraph is a 3D printer that can physically assist the user by assembling the 3D printer’s objects without human intervention, and then running the completed “functional objects”.

For example, in this video, we have prototyped a sandwich application. When cooking, there are many ways to look at recipes, such as on a smartphone, but in the end, a human being has to cook. How much easier would it be if you could just say, “OK Google, I want a sandwich for breakfast tomorrow,” and have it ready when you wake up in the morning? A machine will make the food, so it can be cooked accurately. All you have to do is prepare the ingredients and the freshly prepared food will be ready automatically instead of frozen or instant food.

Saturday, May 21, 2022

The “Mother of Yoda” breaks silence on Baby Yoda and more #SciFiSunday

Delightful story from the inverse on the incredible Wendy Froud, a puppeteer who began working in 1970s New York, and whose iconic work remains some of the must recognizable in her field to this day.

You might not recognize the name Wendy Froud (née Midener), but in the practical effects world, she’s a legend. Renowned in film and television as a pioneer in puppetry, Froud was sought out by directors like Jim Henson early in her career and created countless iconic TV and movie creatures. Yet she remains an obscure name rarely credited accurately on film sites or IMDb.

How Does a Gugusse Roller Work?

Denis-Carl Robidoux takes viewers through rewinding and loading film and so much more in this video on YouTube, via no film school:

The Gugusse Roller is a DIY machine made to digitalize film.
It can transfer film of any format between 8mm and 35mm

How Does a Gugusse Roller Work?

Denis-Carl Robidoux takes viewers through rewinding and loading film and so much more in this video on YouTube, via no film school:

The Gugusse Roller is a DIY machine made to digitalize film.
It can transfer film of any format between 8mm and 35mm

Friday, May 20, 2022

Raspberry Pi Stranger Things Phone Prop Designed for Season 4 Premiere #piday #raspberrypi @Raspberry_Pi

Season 4 is almost here so get dialed into some vintage calls. Guy Dupont created this project for a Stranger Things experience, shared by Tom’s Hardware:

Dupont explains the vintage phone was planned to be positioned in a booth resembling a 1980s pizza shop. What looks like an unassuming prop would occasionally ring. When guests pick up the phone, they would hear random sound bites from the show, scary sound effects and even random pizza orders. Lifting the phone off the hook returns a dial tone sound, the buttons work with an audible sound for each keypress and the speaker will returns a disconnected sound once a number has been dialed.

Learn more!

Tardis Treasure Hunt #Raspberry pi

This maker used Raspberry Pi Pico and LEGO to build a Doctor Who-themed treasure hunt, Via Raspberrypi.com

When Roberto Tyley saw his son’s birthday party exterminated, it ultimately led him to invest time in an amazing Doctor Who-themed treasure hunt, as David Crookes explains.

Last year, many Doctor Who fans embarked on a virtual treasure hunt in a bid to find Jodie Whittaker’s Time Lord. Fast forward to 2022, and maker Roberto Tyley has created a physical hunt – one in which his son, Alexander, was tasked with fixing the TARDIS by finding and entering a series of passphrases with the help of his friends.

The idea evolved over time, sparked by the cancellation of Roberto’s son’s seventh birthday party in 2020. The following year’s bash was held outdoors as a treasure hunt in the local park and the children had to find clues to unlock a LEGO combination safe. “My son loved it so much, he wanted another treasure hunt – but how was I going to top last year’s party?,” Roberto says.

His plan was to hide two screen-based devices in different areas of the park, each taking it in turns to generate passphrases which could then be entered into a treasure safe. By ensuring the devices couldn’t be moved once they were found, the children would need to split into three teams – two by the devices and one by the safe. They’d wait for the passphrases to appear, and co-ordinate the unlocking over their walkie-talkies.

The passphrase devices were made using a couple of Pico-Clock-Green LED-digit electronic clocks fitted with Raspberry Pi Pico boards and programmed so that they would display a series of words. Roberto ditched the safe, however, in favour of a TARDIS built out of LEGO, which he designed using Bricklink’s Studio 2.0.

Learn more!

Infinite Pi on Thermal Foil #piday #raspberrypi @Raspberry_Pi

For Pi Day Tiwsted&Tinned made this looping Pi printer. Thanks for sharing!

A thermal printer continuously prints digits of pi on a loop of thermochromic foil. Digits are streamed by an ESP8266 from google’s pi.delivery database which holds a world record of 50 trillion digits.

See more!

Star Wars Arcade Cabinet with Raspberry Pi @Raspberry_Pi #PiDay #RaspberryPi

Who doesn’t want a Star Wars cabinet game? We could spend all day playing, and our housemates could just stand behind us saying “Stay on target! Stay on target!” But as time goes on, working versions of these cabinets are harder and harder to find. So make James Milroy just made one, with a little help from a Raspberry Pi. Here’s more from the Raspberry Pi Blog:

“My project was to build a replica, or as close as I could reasonably manage, of the Atari Star Wars arcade cabinet,” James Milroy tells [MagPi]. “I really wanted to build a cockpit as that’s what I played on in the eighties, but sadly I didn’t have the room to house it, so the compromise was to build a stand-up cabinet instead…. Initially, I had toyed with sourcing an original cabinet and restoring it, but soon gave up on that idea after finding it nigh on impossible to source a cabinet here in the UK,” James explains. “Almost all cabinets for sale were located in the USA, so they were out of the question due to the high cost of shipping. Atari only made just over 12,500 cabinets worldwide, so their rarity meant that they commanded top dollar, effectively putting them out of my price range. It was at this point that I decided that if it was going to happen, then I would have to make it myself.”

See project!

Portable Video Game and Movie Projector #piday #raspberrypi @Raspberry_Pi

We love it oh so very much when folks combine their electronics skills and their woodworking skills. Y’all – take a look at this build mw33212 shared on reddit:

This one for my brother. 10 and 5mm walnut with maple and some Indian rosewood. Hand tools and a cordless drill for the woodworking. Tried something new with the dovetails on this one.

Inside there’s a raspberry pi 4b running emulation station, a small amp and speakers, a small portable projector (which I’m very impressed with) and a 4 cell 18650 lithium battery board. Yet to see how long it will power the full unit for but seems to be easily good enough for a full movie.

DIY Smart Bike with Raspberry Pi @Raspberry_Pi #PiDay #RaspberryPi

Here’s a fun DIY smartbike project! It uses Raspberry Pi to outfit the bike to turn on lights when it gets dark, keep track of speed, location, and note how long you’ve been using the bike. The project is from keanuDav via Instructables.

See project!

Reducing the Power of the Raspberry Pi SBC @Raspberry_Pi #Pi #RaspberryPi #PiDay

Handy project by Usha Ganesh and Tam Hanna and posted by Robert Perkel up on Hackster.io.

One the biggest challenges in the Internet-of-Things (IoT) is power. Some IoT devices are kept near power outlets, while others must run off a battery or other non-rechargeable energy source. Devices that run on a battery must be carefully designed and implemented to reduce power consumption as much as possible. While small microcontrollers (MCUs) can consume very little power, developing applications on them is more challenging than on a Single Board Computer (SBC), such as a Raspberry Pi® or a similar Unix-based SBC. SBCs are an easy platform to develop on with support for a wide array of programming languages and libraries, but as a tradeoff, they consume a lot more power than a small MCU, even when shut down.

Thursday, May 19, 2022

3D Printed Compliant Mechanism Rubber Band Shooter #3DThursday #3DPrinting

The_Creatologist shares:

I was looking for a compliant mechanism rubber band shooter and couldn’t find one, so I made this!

Hope you have a nice day.

I have a video showing how I made this thing if you want to watch:
this is the URL: https://youtu.be/dmGswXchOOw

download the files on: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:5317212

LIVE CHAT IS HERE! http://adafru.it/discord

Adafruit on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/adafruit

Shop for parts to build your own DIY projects http://adafru.it/3dprinting

3D Printing Projects Playlist:

3D Hangout Show Playlist:

Layer by Layer CAD Tutorials Playlist:

Timelapse Tuesday Playlist:

Connect with Noe and Pedro on Social Media:

Noe’s Twitter / Instagram: http://instagram.com/ecken

Pedro’s Twitter / Instagram: http://instagram.com/videopixil