Goosebent

Here is the Youtube video of my latest bent instrument:


All of the RCA ports have the tips and sleeves soldered together so that they can act as both jumpers and touch points. I found that many of these points only work as touch contacts. You can see in the pictures that I had originally color coded them, but I unfortunately used sharpie for the 4x4 ports, so the color is starting to rub off. This picture has all of the controls labeled:

Click for details
I absolutely love the sounds that come out of it, even when I'm just playing with the feedback. You throw a delay effect on top of this, and wow does it do some cool stuff. Also wanted to thank Brian Jepson for recommending the Flip to me. It's what he used to interview me with at Ignite. Quick and easy to set up, decent video, and decent sound. It's what I used to shoot this, and had my video on Youtube in about an hour.

Bending Workshop Update

The latest workshop went over well. It was not as fully attended as the previous one, but some people actually managed to make some legitimate instruments by the end. Only a total of four people were still around for the jam, but it was amazing none the less. Bill T. Miller was around once again showing his support, and taking additional photographs:


Photos to be posted shortly
I also want to thank Wayne Wylupski for dropping off a massive donation of toys. They ranged the gambit of easy pitch bends, to very complicated toys that I can't wait to dig into. They will be housed at the Willoughby and Baltic, and be around for future workshops.

I want to point out a new google group I started just for circuit bending in the Boston area, Bending Boston. All future communications related to my workshops and the like will go through that list first. I've also created a page to be used as a wiki-style link dump. Hopefully it will become the place to go for recent information, and will allow the facilitation of trade for bending resources in the Boston area.

Something that really struck me as interesting this time was the mix of male to female. This last class was composed of at least 2/3 to 3/4 women. Maybe Fred was right about the topic of his talk. The next workshop has not been scheduled, but I would like to get some artists to perform before the workshop, to show off what can be done with the instruments. If you are interested, then join the list and let us know. If we get enough people interested, we may have a jam-only night, where everyone gets a set, and then an open jam set will happen.

Biggest bend yet

This is the as of yet unnamed bend of a Goosebumps voice changer/sound effects box.


Click for more info.

It is going to be debut at the workshop I'm running this Saturday. So if you want to hear it, show up tomorrow night. I'll get clips online sometime next week.

Bending and Heart update

So the new bending event has a page up with some information. The last event went over extremely well, so I have high hopes. This will be a much longer workshop, with what I hope to be more finished projects. It's free like last time, but donate some money to the space if you have it. Everything goes towards holding public events like these.

Check Out Bill T. Miller's Photo set for pics of the last workshop.

Also, as of today I am officially selling my open heart kit on my website.

Go and check it out. There are also pages on how to make it, and how to program it.

The next circuit bending workshop

I've created a poll to help determine the day and time for the next workshop. Please check it out, as that is what I'm going to go off of to schedule it. Week nights seem to be easier for more people, but the weekends provide more time to work on stuff.

Open Heart Kit

Once again, I've been very busy with stuff, but I'm posting some info about the Open Heart. I've got the PCBs in, tested them, and I'm about to start selling the kits. You can go to the Open Heart page for some info on it.

Or check out the Flickr set for pictures:

I've also designed a flash program that lets you design the animations, and then generate the Arduino code you would need to run it with this kit. It still needs quite a bit of work, but it is at a state I'm comfortable with showing people. It's also open source (as open as a flash file can be), so have at it. To get to the FLA, you just replace the .html with .fla.

I've also decided to start taking pre-orders. The production boards won't be in for another couple of months though. I'm going to send out some evaluations boards to various places online to see if they would be interested in my kit. Once I've got some numbers, I'll send off for an order of PCBs. It will then take a month or so. They will however have nice silkscreens and solder mask, unlike the prototype. Hit up the official page for that button.

The latest share.tv is up

What is share.tv you ask? Well, it's a kicking rad program on Cambridge public access that I've been part of for the past few episodes. You can see me in episodes three, four, and five on the gallery page. Not to mention a full feature on the circuit bending workshop I ran a few weeks ago.



Originally uploaded by lovers v haters.

Check out the Flickr set of Episode 5:
In other news, there are only two seats left for my Atari Punk workshop. I can't believe how quickly it has filled up. I may run a second one shortly, or alternately run something different, like an optical Theremin class.

Atari-punk workshop

I will be running a workshop on the Atari Punk music synth on the 22nd at 7PM. I will walk you through building everything, and you will leave with a simple yet fun music synth that you've made yourself. You can go to the Willoughby and Baltic site to register for the workshop. Kits are available for purchase, which I would suggest you take up on. You should absolutely bring your own case though. Any decent sized hollow toy would work well for this, and it would really add some character. Though one is provided. There are only 10 seats, so I would suggest signing up early. Let me know if you have any questions.

the workshop last night

It went over extremely well (link to the Dorkbot blog entry, full of links). I'm very excited because it let me know that there is a bunch of interest for circuit bending in the area. I'm definitely going to have more of these, as well as some paid workshops in the near future. That way all the parts are provided, and it can be a bit more controlled. Everyone will also walk away with something.

I'm going to the Bent Festival this weekend in NYC, which I'm looking forward to. I've been over-extending myself again, so a break will be good for me. That way I can come back refreshed and really focus on my final projects for class, as there is nothing else coming up in the near future to distract me. Although, as soon as I say that, something always pops up. Actually a few things already have, but I'm getting better about declining things, or putting stuff to the side.

Circuit Bending Workshop

I'll be running a quick circuit bending workshop on April 15th at 7PM for the Boston area Dorkbot group at the Willoughby and Baltic in Davis Square. I'll cover a few basic things like pitch bending, as well as the basics of wiring up audio jacks, pots, and switches. I'll also go over a few best practices in exploration, so that you aren't as likely to fry your toys, and give a general introduction to some of the more advanced stuff out there (speak and spells, atari-punk, etc.).

This is meant to be a fairly low technical barrier type event. So even if you don't know anything about electronics, you can come and have a good time. Hopefully this will be the first of many, and if there is enough interest we could do additional workshops that maybe cover more technical stuff. I will also be giving away a few toys I have that are bend-able as prizes to the people with the "best sounding" modifications (this will be voted on by the group). Share.tv will also be there to help out and film parts of the event.

Go to the blog entry on my circuit bent guitar for an example of what to expect:

Click to get to the flickr set, which has a bunch of information on this bend.
What should you bring?

• some kind of cheap toy that makes noise, the cheaper the better, music and talking based ones are generally easiest to get good sounds out of (suggestions on where to get them are target, CVS, toys-r-us, or any other place that sells cheap crap to kids)
  
• beer
• assortment of switches and buttons you like
• metal things for body contacts, anything you can attach to stuff and then solder to (screws, knobs, and very thick wire works well)
• tools, the more the merrier (wire cutters, screw drivers, jumper wires with alligator clips, etc)
  
• 1/4" or 1/8" audio jacks if you want to have audio output
• both audio and linear potentiometers (volume control pots, etc). along with a suitable knobs
• assortment of resistors if you really want to get complicated (I will have some on hand if you want to dive into that)
• some more beer
• a VERY open mind to what you define music as, and a high tolerance for noise
  

I will have a few of each of these things to trade/sell if you need them, but everything can be bought easily enough at Radio Shack for a decent price. If there is enough interest in getting a bunch of pots and jacks, then let me know, and we can put in an order with Jameco/Digikey, but it only becomes cost effective with 10 or more of a bunch of stuff. We will provide some soldering irons, drills and wire for the permanent mods, but please bring some as well if you have them.

If you have anything you've made, then please bring it by and show us. I'll have some of the things with me that I've posted on this blog about, as well as a few others I've not. Please let me know if you have any questions by responding to the Boston Dorkbot google groups post, or going to my contact page.

I've been busy lately

It's a shame I've not updated this in a while. It's not that I haven't been doing stuff, I have. It's just that I've not been taking notes or pictures. I'll update with some shortly, but first a text update.

I've actually moved forward with having a PCB made for the open heart I made. Not only that, but I've already received the second PCB design in, and I'm actually going to try and sell a kit. I'm currently working on a Flash interface to easily create animations. It will allow you to create frames of animation, and then export the Arduino code. Once that is ready, I'll write up some instructions on assembly, and mail them out to some websites to see what kind of interest there is. My target price is around $15. It will include the PCB, 27 red LEDs, 6 resistors, headers, crimp housings, and some conductive thread. I'll have to see how that all works out though. Hopefully that will all be done in the next couple of months, and you'll see my kit in various stores online.

The president's day project unfortunately didn't get finished in time for the show. The hardware was done, but not the software. I still brought it there, and people were a good sport about it not working. I'll get it running in the next couple of weeks though, as I want it done for Open Studios here in Somerville. At the moment, I don't think it will be too difficult, as I've already done all the hard stuff.

I've also been circuit bending again. I created a nice looping device that also pitch shifts. I'm using the "Yada Yada Yada" toy as the base. Right out of the box you can record around 10 seconds of audio, and the play it back at different pitch/speed based off of a dial. Pretty cool. Luckily enough, if you hold down play, it loops on it's own. So no special circuit is needed. I added a 1/8" input and a 1/8" output jack, a switch to cause it to loop, a switch to turn off the microphone (in case you just want to record the input line), and a switch to cause it to dramatically slow down and distort. I also made the play/record switches conductive, so that you can short it out (which causes it to speed up a bunch). I'm planning on going back to Target and buying as many of these as I can find. I'm going to make a bank of them with a built in mixer.

Last night I was on share.tv on Cambridge Community TV. It was really awesome. I brought my bent guitar, and the yada looper, plugged right in, and had a great time. I'll post once the footage is on the tubes. I'll make a mixer for my stuff next time. I didn't have a method of controlling my own volume, so it was problematic at times. They aren't hard to make, so I should be able to have that done in time for the next one.

I've also been really busy with classes. I started at the Harvard Extension school, taking night classes. It's been tough, as I spend a bunch of time doing class stuff. I've also made a number of things that I've not posted in addition to the ones listed. Such as:

• crank flashlight with a minty-boost kit to make a crank-powered USB charger/power supply
• tiny USB flashlight to go with the USB charger
• miniPOV with headers, so that it can be changed around
• LED cube from the make podcast to go with the modded miniPOV
• Vista desktop PC, because my laptop was too old to run Adobe CS3 to my liking (complete with a 2TB RAID5 drive)
  
• a bunch of LED sequins to go with some sew-able electronic circuits I've been working on
• modified two keyboards into prank keyboards (go and do this, it's quick, easy, and funny as hell)
  
• a gigantic mess in my room
• and I'm sure some more stuff I've forgotten about

Anyhow, I should go back to work, as my lunch break is over. Hopefully I'll get some pictures and schematics up soon enough. I might need to get myself an intern to start documenting my stuff for me (I'm joking, but I wouldn't turn down an application).

I won a contest!

Wow, my Charliplexed heart just won the random (with the power of denial, this is first prize in my mind, and has nothing to do with chance) prize for Instructable's "Get the LED Out" contest. I get a $75 gift certificate for phenoptix, a t-shirt, and a TV-b-gone kit.

Internet, you do realize that this is just encouraging me don't you? When I told my roommates what I had won, one of them said "Great, just what you need, more LEDs". Yes, yes I do need more LEDs. It's only going to get worse from here on out...

Open Heart schematic update

I've updated the Charliplexed heart instructable with the schematic. I've also updated the source code to v1.1.

President's Day Project update

While I didn't get as far as I had hoped, I did make a good deal of progress on my project this weekend. Luckily I was able to enlist the help of my good friend Mike Jedlicka for editing the sound files (something I don't know how to do, and I don't think I have time to learn). So I won't have to worry about that once I get the audio clips to him (once I record them that is).

Anyhow, I've finished the production logic board which will basically control the whole thing. It is uses a total of 5 8-bit shift registers to light lights, control motors, the whole deal. I just need 6 pins off the Arduino (I could have done it with only 3, but I wanted two separate registers so I wouldn't have to send data to all of them all the time).



I also finished up with the light system that will represent the actions taken. There are a total of 4 boards with 8 lights on each (red, yellow, green, white). Here are some pictures.




There is of course a youtube video as well. It just shows the lights going off in order as they will in the final design. Yes, this is functional production code that you are seeing here.

Arduino controlled Charliplexed Heart

For this one I actually created an instructable for it. You can go here to learn how to make it.



Go to the Flickr set


Here are a couple of youtube videos of the two animations I've done for it so far.





Thanks to my friend Stephen Dougherty, I've been able to work out some fairly simple animation software, where you can address any of the LEDs individually(go to the instructable for the link). He's actually working on a bitmath version, that will allow a sixfold increase in the amount of frames (we are currently maxed to about 25). Once a better version of the Arduino software is working, then I'll write something in processing to create the data strings for the animations. I'll update this blog once that is working, and we will make it open and freely available.

President's day project mockup

I've just finished creating a basic mock-up for a project I'm working on for the Boston Dorkbot group's President's Day show.


The Flickr set has a good bit of information.

An Arduino is running the whole thing, which then sends the information to some shift registers. At the moment there are only two 8-bit shift registers, but the final project will have probably six or so. There will be approximately 8 H-bridges running 16 motors, but I'm not sure because I'll have to see how it all works out, there may be more or less.

The final project will be made out of wood, so that it holds up a bit longer. It will have four speaking heads, and a few other things that require motors (like curtains). It will also have somewhere around 30 LEDs for the voting system, and some for lighting.

I just wanted to create the mock-up to get the problems with the code worked out with a physical system. I've written two functions that will be called on in the final design, as well as worked out some of the timing issues with reading the buttons. I still haven't figured out some of the other timing issues, but I will by the end of it. A clock would be great, so I'll have to figure out how to do that to make timing quite a bit easier once I've got the sound files going.

Here is a basic video of what is running at the moment. The buttons and switches will all be software driven in the final project, but they work for now. Once I've cleaned up the code a bit, I'll publish it under the open source license.

Circuit bent guitar

So I've just "finished" up with my first circuit bending project. I put that in quotes, because I thought I had finished it last weekend, but I fell victim to feature creep, and kept adding things. However, I'm done with it now, and I'm ready to move onto the next thing.


Click to get to the flickr set, which has a bunch of information.

I've also uploaded two videos to youtube. This first one is a brief explination.


This second video is a play test.

I just got linked to in the Makezine Blog

Nice, I made it into the Make blog (here is the specific post) with my Joule Thief flashlight. Hopefully this is just the first time of many in which they will show something interesting that I've made. If you aren't familier with Make Magainze, I would suggest you check it out. Hands down the best printed magazine I've seen in a long time. The only negative is that it is just a quarterly, but I guess that is why it is of such high quality.

I'm planning on posting pictures of the circuit bent guitar I made, but I sort of shorted out the circuit last night, so I have to rebuild that. It won't take nearly as long this time, plus I've added a DC plug so I won't keep wasting batteries.

looping switch

This is a circuit that will cause the Radio Shack 9V Recording Module (part number: 276-1323) to loop.



Click on the picture for more information.

On the re-purposing of this journal

Since I've already have a standard livejournal, I'm going to re-purpose this as my project journal. That way I can leave all the geek speak in, and not be worried about boring anyone with details. Basically, if you are here, you are going to be here for the details.

First post

I'm giving this a try, to see if I can embed it into my new website.