Wings in Steel and Glass - mechanical sculpture by Shasa Bolton

Check out the latest piece by Shasa Bolton!

See more sculpture by Shasa Bolton on this web site.

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Bird wing motion study created with nothing more than tongue depressors and paper

Check out this awesome kinetic model of bird wings. The model was created by design student Joyce Lin and is made of nothing more than tongue depressors, paper, and tape. Amazing!

Via Laughing Squid.

[ Thanks Cameron! ]

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The best projects from MAKE magazine in book form

If you are like me, you have been subscribed to MAKE magazine since day one. If not, you've now got a lot of catching up to do. Don't despair, however! They've assembled various topics into collections of articles that make for outstanding books. Take for example, The Best of Make. This 384 book pulls 75 of the best projects from the first two years of the magazine and gives them to you in one handy volume for only $25! That's one heck of a deal.

Inside this issue you will find chapters on tools, electronics, micro-controllers, toys & games, robots, music, flight & projectiles, photography & video, and cars & engines. Each of these chapters contains between 6 and 9 hands-on projects. Here is where you can order The Best of Make.

Also check out their other dedicated books like Make: Electronics, The Makerspace Workbench, The Essential Guide to 3D Printers, and the Eccentric Cubicle (a personal favorite).

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Under-the-hood video of Colin Neu's "First Flight" kinetic sculpture

Did you see the video featuring the amazing kinetic sculptures by Colin Neu? Here is an closer look at one of the pieces featured. This one is titled First Flight. That beefy spring-driven motor you see at the beginning came from an antique gramophone motor. The video shows that there is some extraordinary craftsmanship going on here at every level. I think this sculpture may be as beautiful on the inside as it is on the outside. Bravo!

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Flying geometric jellyfish moves through the air by turning inside out

This helium-filled geometric kinetic sculpture is known as a Schatz cube and uses a process called inversion to propel itself through the air. The object is named for Paul Schatz (1898 - 1979), a German-born sculptor, inventor and mathematician.

This fine working model was created by the folks at Festo who dubbed it SmartInversion.

From the Festo web site:

SmartInversion is a helium-filled flying object that moves through the air by turning inside-out. This constant, rhythmically pulsating movement is known as inversion and gives the flight model its name. With the intelligent combination of extreme lightweight construction, electric drive units and control and regulation technology, inversion kinematics can be indefinitely maintained to produce motion through the air.

Like some kind of angular, contortionist jellyfish, its slow motion flight through through the air is mesmerizing. Researchers are searching for industrial applications for the inversion technique and held a contest that ended in December of 2012.

Here is Festo's page about SmartInversion – airborne geometrical band with inversion drive.

[ Thanks Christoph! ]

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