Awesome Indies: LCRC Kinetic Painting with Robots Workshop

May 18th, 2011

After making tiny vibrating robots from the head of a toothbrush, dipping it in paint and watching them spin on paper, I asked the kids if they were the artists or if the bots were. Mostly the answer was “It tickles!” In this final workshop for 6 to 8 year olds at the LCRC‘s after school […]

Awesome Indies: LCRC Homemade Papercraft Batteries Workshop

May 11th, 2011

In front of a room of 25 astonished faces I dipped my finger into the brine and dabbed the last of the water onto the flower, the LED popping on and cries of “But but…where’s the battery?” echoing amid “Wait…what?” This workshop focused on understanding how a battery works by taking the traditional model of […]

Awesome Indies: LCRC LED Foldie and Pac-Man Tag Game Workshops

April 28th, 2011

Amid screams and shouts the stamping feet of 25 kids jumping from line to line to avoid the ghosts chasing them, their hands cupped tightly around tiny cubes of light illuminated by LEDs, echos up to the rafters in the darkened gym. Gosh those kids were loud. This game was the culmination of a two […]

Awesome Indies: LCRC Squishy Circuit Workshop

April 14th, 2011

We’ve underestimated the potential use of energy emanating from 25 excited kids eating sugared playdoh. I reached this conclusion shortly after starting to talk about squishy circuits with a group of 6-8 year olds at an LCRC after school program. This project is part of Artengine’s community arts initiatives and is funded by the Community Foundation of Ottawa. I was […]

Mod Lab’s March 2nd Recap

March 9th, 2011

Jean-Marc LeBlanc demoed his hack to an Evalbot, a mobile robotic evaluation board for the Stellaris microcontroller, that allows him to host a webpage on a USB stick on the back of this rolling robot. I’d never seen a website that could run away from me before and I do so hope to again. How […]

Mod Lab’s January 19th Recap

January 26th, 2011

Last Wednesday’s meetup was a busy one- Andrew Plumb brought in the Lego-compatible disc buttons he created for wearable circuits along with skeletal Lego cages, one of which is designed to be printed out with working hinges! The disc buttons snap together and have small holes thoughtfully placed with which one can put conductive thread […]

Mod Lab’s November 17th Meeting Recap

November 24th, 2010

At our meeting last Wednesday Richard Briggs, one of Ottawa’s makers from the first Maker Faire and member of the Human Powered Vehicle Operators of Ottawa or HPVOoO, brought in some of the electroluminescent wire he had been working with to create an EL-wired human powered train for the Help Santa Toy Parade put on […]

Mod Lab’s October 22nd Meeting Recap

October 25th, 2010

When Paul Mumby mentioned he had made a 3D printer at the last meetup I had assumed he meant he had procured and built a Makerbot. THAT ASSUMPTION WAS WRONG. Paul brought in his homemade 3D printer to our meetup and got it happily extruding before night’s end. In Paul’s words: “I spent about 3 […]

Mod Lab’s October 6th Meeting Recap

October 8th, 2010

Awesome turn out to Wednesday night’s meetup; Nigel Vezeau brought in and demoed a few of his projects, Andrew Plumb instructed a group on the Makerbot, Derek Ledoux and Justin Dempsey from the Ottawa indie gamer group the Dirty Rectangles came and made LED throwies and I brought in an electronic toy I made with Jimmie […]

Mod Lab’s September 22nd Meeting Recap

September 27th, 2010

Last Wednesday featured the making of a super sensitive sound to light converter from CanaKit and talks of interesting hacks to the Roomba and Spykee. Guy told us an interesting tidbit on knowing if a battery still has a charge- just…stick your tongue on it. Since the body is conductive you’ll either get a little […]