cnc
Latest
Kinect hack turns tourists into 3D souvenirs (video)
As souvenirs go, a miniature replica of yourself -- striking a pose of your choosing on Barcelona's La Rambla street -- is a far sight more original than a bullfights-and-senoritas snow globe. This past January, the hilariously titled BlablabLAB enlisted three Kinects and a RapMan 3.1 to snap passersby and render them into personalized tchotchkes, in a project called Be Your Own Souvenir. Subjects stood atop a small platform, mimicking the human statues on La Rambla, as the Kinects captured their likeness in full 360-degree glory. The resulting images were then processed as a mesh reconstruction, saved as a G-code file, and then fed through a 3D printer -- and voila, out popped the tiny statuettes. If you're a fan of flashy editing and Kinect-based street experiments, check out the video after the break.
M55 Beast Electric Bike is quite appropriately named
Say "electric bicycle" around here and visions of Sanyos with baskets go floating through our heads. The Beast from M55 is something rather different, rather more bodacious. It offers a 40mph top speed and a 75 mile range plus a construction featuring pieces hewn on CNC along with plenty of titanium and carbon fiber bits for good measure. The design is perhaps a bit too in your face for some, but for others is the perfect mix of 'tude and tech. It's been in design for some months now but recently made something of a debut at SEMA ahead of a forthcoming shipping date with pre-orders open now. Cost? If you have to ask... %Gallery-107923%
MakerBot prints another MakerBot, the circle is complete
MakerBot isn't the first self-replicating 3D printer -- that spectacular distinction went to the RepRap Darwin back in 2008 -- but that doesn't make it any less awesome that the $750 machine is now able to produce its own frame. With a month's labor, owner Webca was able to create the entire plastic chassis you see above, using a second MakerBot constructed of the traditional wooden parts. Without knowing how much goop went into the project, it's a touch difficult to say if the method is economical, but there's nothing to keep you from trying the same. Best of all, Webca decided to share his plans with the world -- you'll find instructions for all 150 pieces at the source link, a month off of work in your wildest dreams.
Machined Gear Clock makes watching the time pass a true joy (video)
We've seen no shortage of homegrown clocks in our day, and while most are cute for their time, few are worthy of being lauded in this manner. Alan Parekh's Gear Clock is a delightful mishmash of machined gears, thrown together in a fashion that resulted in an actual time-telling gizmo. Hop on past the break to watch this thing spin, but be sure to hold the mute button for the lead-in. Clearly 'Sound Check' wasn't activated.
Free DLC for 2003's 'Command & Conquer: Generals'
Who says you can't give an old game new DLC? In celebration of Command & Conquer: Generals' sixth birthday -- that's like turning 42, in video game years -- EA is releasing "the lost mission," codenamed Black Sheep. Seriously, the B.S. DLC is ... well, not b.s. -- download it right here, free! Black Sheep was intended to be the third mission in C&C:G's Global Liberation Army campaign, but was removed from the final version and "securely stored away in a secret location" (read: misplaced and forgotten) until now. In the mission, players are given command of the Toxin Tractor, a modified farm vehicle that sprays icky green stuff (that you may recall from other campaign missions and game modes), and ordered to crop dust a town that has been "corrupted beyond salvation." This may have been "controversial" by 2003's standards, but here, in the future, it's all in a day's work. Download C&C:G "Black Sheep" Mission (243 KB)
DIY 3D printer utilizes hot air, sugar to craft random objects
Just when you thought a $5,000 3D printer wasn't such a bad deal after all, the zany gurus at the Evil Mad Scientist Laboratories have put Desktop Factory's iteration to shame. The CandyFab 4000 is a homegrown printer that utilized a bevy of miscellaneous spare parts around the lab as well as the same sort of CNC hot-air control mechanism that we previously saw in the text writing toaster contraption. Their selective hot air sintering and melting (SHASAM) method allows the printer to begin with a bed of granular media (sugar, in this case) in which a directed, low-velocity beam of hit air can be used to fuse together certain areas repeatedly, eventually working the remaining grains into a three-dimensional object. The creators claim that while their CandyFab machine only ran them $500 in addition to junk parts and manual labor, even starting from scratch shouldn't demand more than a grand or so, so be sure to click on through for a few snaps of the fascinating results and hit the read link for the full-blown skinny.[Via MetaFilter]
CNC hot-air gun used to draw faces, text on toast
Slicing up ole Xbox consoles or using immensely powerful lasers to heat your morning cup of joe are certainly entertaining ways to make industrial machinery a bit more fun, but the CNC Toast printer ups the ante by providing an over-the-top replacement for those plastic molds we used as youngsters. By hacking a CNC hot-air gun to respond to a "computer-dictated X-Y control system" and affixing it to the carriage of a printer, the evil scientists were able instruct the toasty (ahem) blaster to move around in a user-selected pattern in order to print images and text onto pieces of toast. Cleverly dubbed "digital toast imaging technology," the apparatus was able to affix a number of slightly awkward faces on slices of bread, and even imprint "Hello World" onto one piece in particular. Still, you can't get the full impression of how geektacular this truly is without seeing it in motion, so that's why you should click on through right about now and hit play, cool?[Via HackedGadgets]
Command and Conquer trailer is Kane-tastic
Xboxygen has a new trailer for Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars. Unfortunately, the footage is purely cutscene and doesn't show any gameplay, but it does feature some pretty explosions and more of Kane's alleged baddass attitude. It also gives more insight into the NOD perspective on this contention. Xboxygen has a 720p version available for download, should you be interested. So what side are you going to take if you plan on picking this up?[Thanks, DjDATZ]
How-To: Design a robotic hand - a vector art CNC tutorial
Every so often, that console-modding Benjamin Heckendorn wanders away from his lair at benheck.com to share some interesting projects with Engadget. In the past Engadget's very own Will O'Brien has demostrated how to build your own CNC (computer numericial control) cutting machine, and he also plans future articles on this subject. Searching the internet, you can't swing a nunchuk without hitting plans for "do it yourself" CNC machines, motor kits being sold, etc. A CNC machine is truly one of the ultimate projects a hobbyist can build and one of the best tools to have in a shop when finished. Yes, even better than a speed square. However, while much is said of what you can cut with such a machine, the how part of design creation isn't always as clear.For today's How-To we're going to go through the process of designing a somewhat complex item that can be cut with a standard 3 axis homebuilt CNC machine: a jointed "robotic hand". This requires several design methods drawn in multiple views, which will demostrate many of the techniques that are useful in preparing items for CNC cutting. At the very least it's a good primer for vector artwork in general, if you've ever been curious about it. So let's take a look at what's involved in prepping our CNC robot factory, shall we?
New footage of C&C 3: Tiberium Wars
Command and Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars was officially confirmed as a 360 title last month, and now we bring you brand new footage of the game, via GameTrailers. In short, the game looks insane (in a good way). Without any sort of HUD or visible interface, it's hard to imagine actually being in control of the madness on screen. The game looks great, especially for an RTS, and looks to be running at a buttery smooth frame rate, too. Watch the video after the break and tell us what you think.
