We've neglected our weblog here for a while. Either we were too busy or just lost interest.

We bought an Arduino board from sparkfun.com to play with. We've been wanting to dabble in microcontrollers and robotics for about 4+ years.

Up until now the barrier to entry was intimidating, because the set up for a microcontroller board requires some knowledge of circuit layout. Ideally you want a real pcb circuit board, and you would have had to assemble and solder it yourself. (Yes, I know about the BasicStamp, but for some reason it never appealed to me.)

With projects like the Arduino coming out, it is easy to start playing around with microcontrollers. On top of that, this is an "open source" project, which means there are lots of contributors and a good userbase building around it.

What can you do with an Arduino? You write very short programs in C code, and upload them to the board via a USB cable. The microcontroller will "remember" the programs even if the power is disconnected thanks to on board FLASH memory. The board has connector sockets to run wires to switches or sensors, or motors, or LEDs. The most basic thing you can do is make an LED flash at a certain rate.

Big deal, right? Well, imagine you hooked it to a plastic skull, with LEDs in the eye sockets? That would be kind of neat. Then you could make a welcome mat switch so that when someone stepped on the mat, the controller would get a signal and could then start flashing the scary skull eyes. See? As with most engineering exploits, you start with something bone simple, and build it up piece by piece to something more complex and interesting.

Of course there are far more interesting things you can do with more complex sensors. There are range sensors using IR or ultrasonic, light sensors, moisture sensors, temperature sensors, GPS sensors, etc etc. Indeed the barrier to entry for doing very complex and interesting electronic projects has come WAY down. What would have taken an electrical engineering degree in the past can now be done by the average Prester John.

We'll see what comes of it.

We wish we were building steam powered robots like this guy! Watch the video.

Among the tools of maker's arte, we seek procure an engine or two from this shoppe. A small store in San Mateo called Hobby Engineering sells such and similar interesting bits. We want to try hobby robotics, but still not yet.

We've done some vegetable gardening over the years, as our father did when we were young. In our last stronghold, the trees were nice, but they blocked the sun. The new place, better exposed, makes the gardening that much more fun. We built a large frame box on the lawn and grew spinach on and on, Cherry tomatoes (weeds! they are!), Japanese cucumbers (production improved when fenced from squirrels), thai chilipeppers (damn hot!), and shiso. Always shiso! Aka Perilla. Aka Beefsteak Plant.

The green onions and carrots survived over winter when we abandoned the garden to the elements. Come Spring, we remember the garden and go find giant green onions and weirdly shaped carrots!

Green onions are great. Cut the bottoms off store bought ones, stick them in the dirt and they grow. Grow, harvest, cut and repeat. Dump a pack of seeds in planter and a million of 'em will rise. Carrots are hardy too, but grow forever till a decent size. We've read they grow well in poor soil.

It will soon be time again for The Annual Robogames. (June 16-18 2006) We went to a previous event in 2004. It was very cool, tho methinks the Maker Faire was better.

e have many alchemists and magisters in our kingdome. They paint stars and moons on their conical caps. Is it for magic, or are they watching the sky? "Watcher of the Skies, what do you watch?"

At the Maker Faire, we heard a tale incredible and tempting!

At the Chabot Space and Science Center in Oak's Lande, as darkness falls they meet once per Freitag, and hold forth on the ways of polishing a rough glass into a Telescope by hande! Those brave enough to take up the quest can tinker even up to a 20" sky watcher that would normally cost many thousands of Coine of the Realm, all for a much lesser expense in materiele and a much time spent polishing a lens!

Me thinks his Majesty will commend us to join the Lensmen's guild!

here are the artisans? The die makers? The lathers and punch pressers? Men who built radios and overhauled their own engines? Who arc welded or hammered copper sculptures in their spare time?

My country saw the fading of a once great manufacturing economy. My family was directly involved in the factory boom after World War II. I grew up around my Uncle's metal stamping factory. That factory is gone.

Service and Info economies are the new thing. Information Services are transferred at the speed of light.

But something was lost. To manufacture is to have a hidden asset: knowledge, tools, and exposure to the possibilities.

When a country outsources its manufacturing, it loses a mind-set: a culture of tools, the craft of mastering matter. The art of making. It denies generations the exposure to engineering, science, and creativity that comes of manufacturing.*

The culture of consumerism, turns custom-making into a vestigial skill, lost in favor of buying unsatisfactory things we don't need and disappointing factory food.

A consumer culture sees pre-packaged products attached to price points. The engineering of the products is inaccessible magic. The choice of what to possess: limited by lowest common appeal, cost cutting vendors, and by our income.

But there is a Renaissance afoot. Engineers, Artists, Journalists and Book Publishers are promoting a new "do it yourself" (DIY) culture.

"DIY" culture engages the mind, reconnects us to engineering as art that any one can do. Assume the role of maker, and fashion unique objects for our own needs.

We have no engineering degree, but we will be engineers. We wil find 1,2,3 instructions, and low cost parts from unexpected sources. We will recycle and repurpose weird stuff into raw materials for custom made objects.

Our Liege Lord thinks this is an idea whose time is come (nay was ever so.)

Three of us made pilgrimage to the in the land of San Mateo. What wondrous werkes we did see! More reports of what we saw are to come.

Til then...Here's a photo of Leigh popping a balloon: This was taken using a rig which uses the sound of the popping balloon to activate a flash. Cameras open on long exposure in the dark, the balloon is popped, flash!, and balloon-in-mid-pop is captured! Wonders Never Cease!

More photos of high speed balloon popping can be found via a "Flikr Photostream"

What do you think about the "do it yourself" movement? write a comment!

*It was pointed out in "The Japan That Can Say No" that manfucturing is a form of creativity (this point made to counter the idea that America created all the ideas and Japan merely copies and manufacturers what others have created.) Manufacturing capability is a resource that can lead to new ideas and technologies in and of itself - The people exposed to the tools of manufacturing and the ideas and concepts of manufacturing are well placed to be inspired to think of new ways to use the tools and techniques of "making".