Engraved Into Memory: Xylocopa's Mad Scientist Alphabet Blocks

This post is proud to have been syndicated to the Ponoko blog.

File this under 'unique things to do with laser engraving':

Xylocopa's 'Mad Scientist Alphabet Blocks' are building blocks for the budding young maker/inventor, or those big kids. They sport such home-truths as G for Goggles, U for Underground Lair and Z for Zombies, all engraved with beautifully detailed illustrations.

They're a beautifully executed product for the maker market, and the kind of low volume, high value product that perfectly suits on-demand production with a laser. Xylocopa is a husband-wife design team from Tucson, Arizona selling a range of really interesting jewellery, home decor and paper products, all using largely laser cut wood. It is design twists like this that can breath new life into previously ubiquitous products, thanks to the new-found economy of digital manufacture.

via Make blog.

Efficiency is the goal - The Art of Engineering

Efficiency is the goal - The Art of Engineering

Duncan Drennan has some great examples of why I think of eco-design as a matter of efficiency and often vice versa too! He also links to an interesting page of statistics on cycling in comparison compared to other modes of transport.

I would add:

Efficiency is open source - when we share ideas, we stop duplicating each other's work (wastage) and can spend our time more usefully building on each other's ideas. Open Source Design leads to distributed and hence local manufacturing which is highly energy efficient in terms of transportation, and resource efficient in terms of sourcing of components/materials (small scale open designers re-use stuff more).

I like Duncan's concise, infrequent posting, I wish more blogs were like his!

George Murray, music therapist website

I recently finished a site for my friend, George Murray, who is a music therapist. I'm like a one-stop-shop for the very niche market of music therapy websites! Except that I had to re-learn a lot of stuff so there were several stops on the way. For the record I don't really want to do websites as they seem like a lot of effort without even the pleasure of a tangible thing at the end or getting to go outdoors, say. But I'm pleased with the result, as is George.

Round and Round and Round: Ring Calendar by Sebastian Bergne

This post is proud to have been syndicated to the Ponoko blog.

Icon magazine recently did a special feature on Ponoko with furniture and product designer of repute, Sebastian Bergne, and the results are available at his showroom on Ponoko. The feature has some great discussion as well as audio and video of Bergne and his experience with Ponoko.

I particularly like Sebastian Bergne's Ring Calendar as it reinforces my perception of time as an eternally revolving thing: day follows day, week follows week, month follows month, on and on. This idea might depress some more sensitive souls, but as the showroom Spunique placidly puts it, the calendar may otherwise "give you the everyday satisfaction of interacting with its calm composition".

Of course the other thing I like about the calendar is its elegant and technically simple design, completely laser cut from melamine faced MDF. The assembly appears to really exploit the accuracy achievable with laser cutting, as does Bergne's other Ponoko product, the Bandit. Bandit is a playfully conceived 30cm ruler/rubber band catapult, that uses a living hinge cut into acrylic as a trigger mechanism. Most cunning. The Icon feature has more to say about the development of this part of the design.

Bergne is no small name, with a vast portfolio of furniture and products designed for a wealth of clients, many of which form part of the London Design Museum's Collection. It's great to see the established names mixing with the new names in the Ponoko marketplace!

via Ponoko and google search

Drawdio Brings New Meaning to Sketching with Hardware

This post is proud to have been syndicated to the Ponoko blog.

The latest kit from Adafruit appears to be another banger. Ladyada writes on her blog about Drawdio:

"Originally designed by J Silver, when I first saw the Drawdio at Maker Faire I knew it would be a great project for beginners: A lot of fun with instant gratification! Essentially, its a very simple musical synthesizer that uses the conductive properties of pencil graphite to create different sounds. The result is a simple toy that lets you draw musical instruments on any piece of paper."

I am unfathomably excited by this project, combining as it does two loves of mine: abstract expressionism and atonality. Sorry, I mean sketching and music!

Ladyada posts a great video presumably taken at Maker Faire showing Mr. Silver and a whole host of people playing with the invention - there is a great social aspect to the experience too as users can create more possibilities by holding hands whilst interacting with each other's doodles. It is worth noting that Jay Silver comes straight from that hotbed of maker talent, MIT's Media Lab, specifically the Life Long Kindergarten group.

I wonder if there is potential for a Drawdio/Photomake mashup? You could certainly have any sketches that you think are worth preserving converted into a lasercut outline without much effort..

via ladyada's ranting

Arduino fuel economy gadget seeks designer.

This post is proud to have been syndicated to the Ponoko blog.

I've been keeping an eye out for Arduino projects that might require a bit of industrial design input, and then I found one where I should have started looking: The following, via the Arduino Playground seems a particularly well developed project.

MPGuino is "a reasonably low-cost device that will gauge your MPG, even for cars that do not have an OBD-II interface in their car... this device uses inputs from the Vehicle Speed Sensor(VSS) and one fuel injector control wire, both of which are easily found in just about all electronic fuel injected cars."

More technical info can be found at Ecomodder's forum, while the wiki carries some examples of existing enclosure solutions, mainly boxy off-the-shelf jobs from Radioshack et al. Perhaps combined with Flightsofideas' Sketchup plugin [blogged here] or Curious Inventors' method [blogged here] the indie designer community could come up with something more sleek for the discerning car owner. Even better, if any entrepreneurial Arduino-types would like to commission a design through Ponoko ID...

via google search

Own it or Share it?

This post is proud to have been syndicated to the Ponoko blog.

At first glance, Own-It did not seem like an endeavour that I would like. The London and North England based organisation define themselves in this way:

"Own-it offers free intellectual property advice for creative businesses. Within your business or your practice, you've probably created a wealth of in-house ideas, designs, music, writing, images – in short, 'intellectual property' - which can make you extra money, as long as you give it the proper legal protection. Own-it will show you how."

Firstly, there is the proprietary nature of its title. Secondly, the promise of 'extra money' generally switches me off in any context. However I was pleased to find that beyond the usual dogmatic advice to ring-fence all IP by default, Own-it have a good amount of information on Creative Commons, Copyleft and Open Source here, alongside informative articles on design IP mechanisms in general.

There's no doubt that Own-it offer a valuable service and I like the well summarised definitions on their website, but there still seems to be little comparative relation made between the reasons for protecting one's IP by closing it off and reasons for freeing one's IP by opening it up. The two will have to meet at some point, at which time, citing the collaborative and evolutionary benefits of open sourcing, and the need to financially exploit one's ideas, while not addressing the inherent contradictions therein, will simply no longer suffice. Surely the likes of Own-it are best placed to explore this frontier, although they might have to change their name to 'Share-it' first to convince me.

Own-it sponsor Greengaged, which looks to be another exciting event partly from the folks over at [re]design. Greengaged is:

"a 7 day hub of events, debates, workshops, exhibitions, seminars and masterclasses bring together all sectors of the design industry to focus on sustainability issues, exchange ideas and carve out new roles for design."

All taking place rather conveniently during this year's London Design Festival, at the Design Council and on now.

Ten Green on Re-nest

Perusing my website stats for September, I come across 'Apartment Therapy' portal, Re-nest who wrote some encouraging things about the Ten Green project(s) and added some really good ideas for developments:

We think that the beer bottle shelves might be a little too college dorm-room quirky in our place, though maybe we'll make one for our younger brother. But we can see the wine bottle shelves or coffee table fitting in right at home. The warmth of the glass might also be complimented if you used rustic reclaimed barnwood for the planks, or a dark high-gloss espresso-colored stain would give it a sharp, clean look.