Tag: DIY

People take their Halloween costumes pretty seriously, but we think legendary modder Ben Heck should win the prize for geekiest creation this year. His 'Portal'-inspired shirt features a rear-facing camera that feeds video to a chest-mounted LCD, allowing you to look right "through" him. Watch Heck hack the whole thing together in the latest episode of the 'Ben Heck Show,' embedded after the ...

Parents often fret about video game addiction and the effects of violent games, but one super-geek dad has apparently realized how to address those concerns. Eleven-year-old Joseph DeRose loves gaming, so his perceptive father recently took part in -- and actively promoted -- his son's pastime by helping him to construct an incredibly cool Halloween costume. Relying on an incredibly steady ...

Besides the days when we receive a Netflix DVD, checking the mail is a chore on par with taking out the trash, which is exactly where most of the paper we pull from our mailbox ends up. But a series of handmade, mechanical cards by artist Bradley N. Litwin aim to make snail mail fun again. The first card, dubbed The Radial Engine, is a moving cross-section of a crankshaft, and is now available ...

Niklas Roy has devised an incredibly clever method of maintaining his privacy. Faced with a steady flow of foot traffic, Roy engineered a robotic "smart" curtain to block his first-floor apartment window from peering pedestrians. The Curtain Control system employs a surveillance camera, motion-tracking software and a motorized curtain. The computer identifies a target and then positions the ...

The Web is teeming with the unrealized ideas of both students and established designers who set out to produce astonishing renderings and prototypes for unusual products. Unfortunately, due to the lack of time, money, or technology, many of those products never move from the planning stages to the mass market. But that doesn't mean we can't salivate over their creations, nevertheless. Can you ...

Bringing a smile to a geek's face is easy: take several things they love (especially things they love ironically), and jam them together in some ridiculous way that's both incredibly novel and completely useless. It's a flawless formula that leads to the creation of things like this tweeting Snuggie (or Slanket if that's your bag). The recipe is simple. Take one cheap piece of infomercial-famous ...

We already know that kites outfitted with cameras can provide a DIY alternative to satellite imagery, as was evidenced in Grassroots Mapping's overhead shots of the oil-strangled Gulf Coast. Now, Frank Taylor, the author of the Google Earth Blog (not officially affiliated with the Menlo Park-based Net behemoth), has provided his favorite aerial imagery producer with some hi-res shots of his own, ...

Luke Geissbühler and his children are hardly the first people to send a weather balloon up into space with an HD camera attached. But that doesn't stop us from watching in awe every time we see a DIY craft go up and send back shaky footage of Earth's blue atmosphere bleeding into the black void of space. The video was captured by a high-defintion camera stashed with an iPhone (for GPS ...

Ben Heck is an all star in the field of DIY and modding. The man who has turned almost every game console under the sun into a portable system (be it handheld or laptop) now has his own show dedicated to making his fans' DIY dreams into reality. Mr. Heckendorn took time out of his hectic schedule of soldering and ripping things apart to chat with us at Maker Faire this weekend. Read on after the ...

There is almost nothing a dedicated DIY nerd can't cram into an R2-D2 chassis, and here's some solid proof from UCLA engineering student Brian DeVitis. This astromech droid is a highly modified ice chest packed with 11 consoles, both current and classic, that -- thanks to R2's projector -- can be played wherever there's a blank wall. Check out photos of the build at DeVitis's site and coverage ...

The conventional stereotypes of girls' involvement with technology are being assaulted from every angle these days, as more girls enter the tech industry and flock to games like 'World of Warcraft.' Now, the Lower East Side Girls Club is trying to change the perception that robotics engineering is just for the boys. Girlzilla was created by 11 girls from low-income families for the Howl! Arts ...

The iPod Nano wristwatch has arrived, and it's probably the best use for the Nano these days. Even Steve Jobs mentioned the Nano's potential as a watch when unveiling it to the world. So, grab a slim-enough wristband, loop it through the clip on the back, and see your fellow Apple fanboys get green with envy. Also, as a disclaimer, you may want to invest in some Bluetooth headphones, or at least ...

Barbecue connoisseurs will attest that, despite the seemingly exorbitant prices, fancy smokers present the most tantalizing and mouth-watering option for slow-cooking meat. The devices also inevitably prompt lame BBQ attendees to offer a played-out, sigh-inducing, "With that price, does it cook the meat for you and tell you when it's ready?" Well, Peter Rauch has created a DIY smoker that ...

Nearly forty years after Yuri Gagarin became the first person in outer space, Denmark is set to become the fourth nation ever to put a man into orbit (following Russia, the U.S., and China). More importantly, however, they are doing it without government funding, and, if successful, will be the first nation in history to do so. The team, the Copenhagen Suborbitals, is made up of Danish ...

Well, folks, it's official. Humankind has hit the nadir of sloth. It's not because somebody designed this mechanical, hands-free channel-changer. We're pretty sure it's a joke that you can witness after the jump. No, the reason we have lost faith in humanity is that we want the mechanical, hands-free channel-changer. Hook us up with this thing, a snuggie and a KFC bowl of sadness, and we'll be ...