301 Moved Permanently

Posted August 9, 2011 by Chris

Braille has been the standard medium for blind people for a very long time, however with the advent of computers, the human-computer interface becomes trickier. The BrailleDuino attempts to bridge the gap by creating an interface that lets you type in braille ‘code’ instead of letters.

Posted August 8, 2011 by Chris

Another quad-copter article with a twist: this one is purely open source with extraordinary documentation, both hardware and software. The next gen multicopter is a remote control quad copter designed for the DIY crowd to duplicate on their own. Hardware and software are documented for you to modify, recreate or learn from.

Posted August 7, 2011 by Chris

This article is short, sweet and to the point. Using some jameco and parallax parts this tutorial guides you through the process of getting started with microcontroller prototyping on a breadboard. The parts are all listed out and pictures included for clarity.

Posted August 6, 2011 by Chris

Here’s an article that presents a rather innovative look at how to spoof magnetic card readers. The spoofer uses an atmega168 connected up to an electromagnet. The article has the source code, hardware schematic and action shots, don’t miss it!

Posted August 5, 2011 by Chris

Just as popular science says “now this is the droid we’re looking for!” Someone with far too much time went ahead and stuck 8 console gaming systems inside of an R2D2 model with a projection display. I wish there were more details on the electronic innards but the pictures will have to suffice my curiosity.

Posted August 4, 2011 by Chris

Finally, Robotics Month is here! To celebrate, a host of Animatronics Tutorials will be released starting today: Animatronic Eyebrows. This tutorial gives you an intro to some basic animatronic terminology while also building a system capable of expressing emotion. Mini Hobby Servos are used as actuators and a microchip PIC 18F452 performs the digital control.

Posted August 3, 2011 by Chris

In a creepy looking monster twist here is a parallax powered animatron that actually has a brain. Aside from being able to move, blink and talk, this animatron has built in speech recognition. Check out the demo video and full article in the pdf.

Posted August 2, 2011 by Chris

R2-D2 is a favorite to geeks everywhere and at least one of us in China has brought some life and extended features to the little droid. This project which was submitted for competition in Beijing is a combo of navigation, firefighting and automation rolled into one.

Posted August 1, 2011 by Chris

Here’s a creepy project that uses electrodes to ‘shock’ your hand muscles into place. The article describes in great detail how the device works as it is attached to a research study. The specific application they mention for this device is helping to teach beginners how to play instruments correctly.

Posted July 31, 2011 by Chris

Here’s an article describing a conservatively but well designed digital oscilloscope. The Digital part here means the main input is into a DAC instead of op-amps. Atmel microcontrollers are used for processing and video display. The article describes all the details of design and theory of operation, so go build your own!