February 2020 brain dump

Yet another brain dump post. (brain dump: snapshot of the internal state of a knowledge database for transfer or archiving purposes). Previous: Jun 2019, Feb 2019, Others.

Audio

• Hacking the Pocket Operator - A pocket operator is a cheap, small mini synth, made by Teenage.engineering (no link love). But the devices are fragile and easily broken. I only had mine for 30 mins before it shattered. This link is to someone else that had the same issue and was able to figure out the pinout for the LED screen. I would not suggest buying these boards. Do not buy.

Laser cutter / CNC

• Squid Hunter model - Wooden spinning submarine chasing a squid. Its a kit from Solarbotics, The Solarbotics Squid Hunting CarouSol Kit
• Ariba Box - A list of simple CNC plans for cheap. They have a youtube series as well that goes thought the design process and assembly.

• Maze dice sculpture - A very cool project where they made plates with a maze design that were glued onto a 20 side dice like sculputre. Here is a picture of the Connectors

Photography

• TOP 100 PHOTO IDEAS - Simple ideas for making interesting photos using props. It gave me some ideas.

Quantified self and self improvement

• I really liked the advice from CCPGray in this video about about having a year theme instead of setting a new years resolution. They have a journaling book that helps supplement the themes idea that can be found here at cortext brand store not that the book is required.

Keyboards

• Hub16 - A Programmable Macro Keyboard tha tI am planning on using to replace my numpad of my keyboard. The knobs are a nice bonus feature. Fully open source with some good assembly instructions.