Yearly Archives: 2012

A Spectacular Speck on the Sun

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Today, Tuesday June 5, 2012, the planet Venus— the planet in our solar system that is closest to the shape and size of Earth —will leisurely pass squarely between the Earth and sun.

The Transit of Venus, as it is called, is a once (or maybe twice) in a lifetime event. If at all possible, make an effort to see it today, because you won’t have another chance… at least until the year 2117.

While it will not be visible everywhere in the world (see map), it will be visible for all of North America, Asia, Australia, and eastern Europe. (The latter, towards sunrise on June 6.)   The transit begins at 22:09 UTC, peaks at 01:29 UTC, and ends at 04:49 UTC.  Here in the PDT time zone, that’s 3 PM, peaking at 6:30 PM, and finishing below the horizon. (More at the LA Times.)

Now, how to actually view it?

If you were clever, you might have stashed away an eclipse-viewing filter from the recent solar eclipse.  If not, another option— one that is cheap and easy to find at hardware stores —is a set of welding glasses with a #14 filter. (That’s black glass. Sadly, those dark green goggles that you found in the shed are likely not safe for direct solar viewing.)

But, as the Ontario Science Center warns you,

Be careful: there are many materials that may seem to block out the Sun’s rays, but which are not safe to use for solar viewing. DO NOT LOOK AT THE SUN THROUGH sunglasses, photographic neutral density filters, polarizing filters, photographic film, dark plastic such as garbage bags, or smoked glass.

 

The other approach to consider is indirect viewing. You can build a pinhole projector, or a simpler yet version.  You can also use a telescope set of binoculars to focus sunlight onto a surface for indirect viewing. (Using binoculars or a telescope for direct viewing requires a carefully chosen solar filter, to be safe.)

If all else fails— maybe you’re in cloudy Portland —NASA has got you covered. Head right over here for a “live” feed of solar pictures from the SDO spacecraft in orbit around the Earth, and updating every 15 minutes.

Update: A nice summary of the historical background of viewing transits of Venus is here.

[Image source]

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Modkit Micro on Kickstarter

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modkit

Our friends at Modkit are running a new Kickstarter campaign for their excellent Modkit Micro software.

[… ] Microcontrollers are no longer just for engineers — anyone can now pick up an Arduino board at their local Radioshack! Now that microcontrollers are even easier to find and buy, they should be just as easy to interact with and program. Modkit Micro works to make microcontrollers accessible to anyone, regardless of their particular background or skill set.

Modkit Micro is a graphical programming environment for microcontrollers that supports a growing number of popular microcontroller platforms including Arduino and Wiring boards. It makes it easy for almost anyone (perhaps especially those with no programming background) to get started using microcontrollers, just by dragging and dropping blocks on their screen to write the firmware.

That part is already pretty neat, but what’s really great about Modkit is that it isn’t trying to be a substitute for “real” programming in source code. When you’re ready to go deeper, Modkit allows you to go “under the hood” to directly view and edit the code that it generated for you. If you’d like early access to try out Modkit, we’d encourage you to support their project— they’re opening up the next round of access to supporters this month.

Link: Modkit Micro on Kickstarter

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The Heathkit Build – Part 2 – Building

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IMG_2769 - Version 2

Last part we unboxed the Heathkit, looked at all the components, and started to build some of it. Now it’s time to finish off the build with the three main plates. This part is cool as you are able to see the creation come together before your eyes. We even created our own replacement part!

We also saw some cool vintage Heathkits at the Electronics Flea Market, and will show some pictures of those. Read on for more!

Continue reading The Heathkit Build – Part 2 – Building →

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Behind the Scenes with our Artist-in-Residence

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RobotGrrl @ Evil Mad Scientist 2


Thanks to Erin “RobotGrrl” Kennedy for being our Artist in Residence this spring! She has headed back to Canada after Maker Faire.

Erin has just written what is perhaps the only “behind the scenes” blog post about life here at Evil Mad Scientist Laboratories, which you can read over on her RobotGrrl blog.


RobotGrrl @ Evil Mad Scientist 1


Erin has also written blog posts here on getting started with AVR microcontrollers, and about unboxing an old Heathkit. She’ll be posting part two of the Heathkit build here in the near future.

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Ladyada’s Workshop in LEGO

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Adafruit has an awesome LEGO kit design for Ladyada’s Workshop up on LEGO CUUSOO. CUUSOO is a site where people can submit designs for new LEGO sets or vote to support designs that have already been submitted. With enough support, LEGO may eventually turn these into actual production kits. With your support, maybe we can all have the chance to play with a LEGO version of MOSFET, a pick-and-place and a soldering iron.

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Shadows of an Eclipse

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Eclipse 2012- 5

There were a lot of amazing things that we saw this weekend at Maker Faire— everything from live demonstrations of snails creating artwork (by Presley Martin) to the DIY pick and place machine (from buildyourcnc.com).

There was also something special in the sky: the solar eclipse on Sunday.

Eclipse 2012- 9

Viewed elsewhere (e.g., further north in California) this was an annular eclipse, where the sun does not disappear entirely, but instead becomes a ring of fire (since the apparent size of the moon is not large enough to block the full disk of the sun).

For us at Maker Faire in San Mateo, it was a spectacular partial eclipse, which we were able to view through solar viewing filters, kindly handed out by the Exploratorium.


Eclipse 2012- 8

Of course, it turns out that you don’t actually need a solar filter to watch the eclipse. Any little aperture— in this case the cap between my hand and the camera —can act as the pinhole in a pinhole camera and project the image of the sun onto a surface.


Eclipse 2012- 4

Eclipse 2012- 2

So if you’re not sure if an eclipse has started, or how much of an eclipse it is, just hold out your hands and make some little apertures; the shadows will show up with little bright spots in the shape of the sun, whether that’s a circle, ring, or crescent.

Eclipse 2012- 1

Stranger yet is to look around at all the shadows that you see every day. Even the shadow of your hand takes on an unexpected shape when the sun is anything other than round.
There are actually five outstreched fingers on my hand here, but you can hardly tell that when every bit of light that seeps through (or around the edges) projects a crescent-shaped image.

We take for granted that the shadow of an object will the same shape as the object, but as you can see, that isn’t necessarily the case when the light source isn’t round.

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New Bumper stickers!

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Just in time for Maker Faire, we’ve got brand new vinyl stickers, reflecting the new design of our site.

Specifications: 10.5″ x 2.0″ (266 x 51 mm), UV coated and weather resistant on tough vinyl, with an easy-peel backing. Shown above with Diavolino for scale.

(Sorry, no datasheet yet.)


If you’d like to show your support for our little project blog, let us humbly suggest that these new stickers just might considerably enhance the appearance of your car, laptop, lab notebook, bike, sumo robot, name tag, home-brew 3D printer, tesla coil, K’nex gun, interositor, oscilloscope, fission reactor, hovercraft, or electronic art projects.


Come find us at Maker Faire— we’ll have a stack of these to give away —or pick them up at our store, where they’re part of our site-wide pre-Maker Faire “DIY Fever” sale this week.

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Robot Party & Trivia!

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Robot Party @ Evil Mad Science

The ROBOT PARTY is Thursday (today!) at 8PM ET / 5PM PT! In addition to everyone showing off their robots, we will be doing some trivia tonight! Also giving away a couple of Evil Mad Science prizes: a Diavolino and a Larson Scanner! Perfect for evil robot brains… :)

If you have a robot, join the hangout on Google+ HERE! Be sure to leave a comment on one of the posts so we can add you to our circles for the party.

Thanks to the new Google+ Hangouts on Air feature being available to everyone, if it works out we won’t be streaming to ustream as the viewers will be able to watch it live on Google+!

What is the Robot Party?
The Robot Party is a weekly Google+ hangout that brings together robot builders from all over to share their robots, knowledge, and ask questions! It is for all age ranges, young or old, just bring your robot!

Hope to see ya at the Robot Party! ;)

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