Thanks for last night

[Martin Raynsford]

I really enjoyed last nights meet up and am looking forward to the next one. The shop seemed to be an excellent place to hold it and Saturday night worked well for me.

 

Thanks also to Paul for helping me with sanity checks on my project. I know we didnt actually crack the IR link as hoped but I now have some renewed enthusiasm for a project that has been sat around for a while, who knows, maybe next meet I'll have something that actually flys. Today I will be mostly upgrading/repairing my CNC to compensate for the fact I'm a numpty at drilling holes by eye.

 

Does the SHDC have a logo? I'll glance briefly at Vicky, the resident artist, but also there are presumably lots of arty people in the shop that might be able to come up with something.

 

I had a few thoughts about the physical version of a google maps, you could use this kind of arrangement, http://letsmakerobots.com/node/8194, to rotate the globe to the desired angle, and for zoom you could have a series of lenses that switch in and out to magnify the spot on the globe.

And finally for those of you who didnt take the box, here's what you could have won... http://sites.google.com/site/shdcboxofjunk/
Jonathon, hopefully you will find something inspirational in the box and when you are ready to pass it on I'll happily share the site with you so you can add your own page detailing what you put in the box and also if you do make a project using something from the box you could add some photos of that too.

Martin

[Zaphodikus]

Another thank you to the organizing faithful.

Very informative, and so much inspiration. Almost too much.

I will order my mbed next week, and hopefully collect and publish all
the photos in some useful fashion during the week.
I might create a flickr group or a picassa group if none already
exists.

Conrad

[Chris Styles]

Hi All,

 

I didn’t make it last night (or in fact for the last 14 events L ) but I did see a mention of Maker Faire on the mailing list yesterday.

 

Dan and I will be heading up to man the mbed stand at Maker Faire. I was expecting to struggle along on the train carrying all the kit we needed, because driving was a bit excessive. If there are a few people going, it might then make sense to hire a minibus and make a road trip weekend of it. Anyone interested in that?

 

Cheers,
Chris

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[Paul Crouch]

First off, just wanted to say thanks to all for last night. I enjoyed it and will make all efforts to make it again in future. 

I too was thinking about doing a train trip to the Maker Faire, but a lot depends if my wife ends up working and, of course, on funds. Anyone know how much a return ticket to Newcastle costs?

- Paul C (mobile)

Thinking up new ways to make life difficult for myself...

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[Dan Ros]

Indeed, good time had by all I think.

Some pics from the night:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/danros/sets/72157623233905974/

[Robert Jason Meerman]

I'm very impressed with those - what camera did you use? I want one! :-)

- Robert

[Dan Ros]

Thanks!

It's a Sony Alpha 200, but what really makes the photos is usually the
lens, in this case it's a Sony 50mm F1.8.

If you're interested, what makes the difference here is the f-stop -
F1.8 refers to the ratio of aperture ('width' of the lens) versus the
focal distance. The smaller the f-stop the greater the effective
aperture, and the greater the aperture, the more light passes through
the lens.

Turning the f-stop to 1.8 or thereabouts has two effects - first the
increased amount of light coming through the lens means you don't need
a flash, which generally tends to make a picture look pretty bad, and
secondly, it means the depth of field (the range of distances in
focus) is reduced significantly, which blurs backgrounds nicely.

Pretty much any SLR camera fitted with this sort of lens should get
pretty similar results.

Cheers,

Dan

[Simon Ford]

btw, we're trying to get something sorted for shdc#17 on sat 30th Jan;
more when we get confirmation of venue.

Simon

[Nick Evans]

Hi All,

I've had a look at what I need to complete my spare parts PC.

It looks like what it comes down to is:

1 x DDR2 RAM DIMM , 533Mhz or better, preferably 1GB
1 x 20 Pin ATX power extension cable, at least 20cm long
1 x 40 pin to 44 pin IDE adaptor

If anybody has any of this stuff and would be willing to donate then let
me know.

Cheers,

Nick

[Paul Crouch]

Have we got confirmation for Sat?

I came off my motorbike yesterday, but still hoping to make it. I need a
good reliable black ice warning for a motorbike; I'm thinking of something
that senses temperature and humidity, and accounts for rate of change maybe?
Also, how about an IR thermometer that can be aimed at the road some
distance ahead? It could be hacked to give an alarm too. Any other ideas?

- Paul C

Thinking up new ways to make life difficult for myself...

Simon

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07:34:00

[Simon Ford]

Hi All,

I think we'll probably postpone it, as we can't get The Shop this
weekend. We were looking for another venue, but given a) the shop
worked well, b) it is short notice, c) we haven't found another, and
d) as the shop worked well we are happy to promote it a little wider
so would want a little more time, i think it is best to wait!

We're now looking at getting the Shop for sat feb 20th, and we'll
confirm if we can get it. Put it in your diaries!

We can still do a SHDP in the mean time :)

Simon