Link-O-Rama 06/08/10: Fabric Dye, Marriage Proposals, and Steel Skulls

I’m Dyeing to Get My Hands On a MakerBot

The MakerBot community continues to innovate. Jonathan Barclay experimented with dyeing white ABS plastic using standard RIT fabric dye. The entire process is documented on his blog and while I doubt it will change manufacturing, I think we will soon be seeing cool multi-colored robots in FIRST robotics competitions across the country.

FabTours

Heather Brundage, MIT Grad Student, and physical product entrepreneur is organizing tours of Boston area manufacturers branded under the name “FabTours“. Excellent idea to help Boston’s strong start up community understand what it takes to go from bit to atom.

Lasersaur – Open Source Laser Cutter

While Diaspora might have broken records raising money for their startup the physical world will not be denied. NYC’s NORTD Labs has received funding to develop an open source laser cutter, similar to those sold by Epilog. They are already 50% over target, but this is an ambitious project and will likely need extra capital. They have done it before with an open source touch screen technology so pledge a couple Starbucks worth of support. While you are at it, check out Alex Gourley’s cool PedalSense project, see the widget on the sidebar for more details.

Laser Cutter Proposal

People make all sorts of cool things with laser cutters, but this might be the first time one is used to make  a union between two people. Watch the video to see how a nerdy artist convinced a beautiful woman to marry him with the use of CAD and a laser. I’m sure self-replication will soon follow.

The Future of Teaching People to Making Things

In 1990 Ken Burns released a nine part documentary on the Civil War. It was a massive success, one of the most watched documentary films in history and 20 years later it could probably be remade with a production budget under $<10K.

I wonder how soon before amateur video can deliver world class education and create a similar societal impact? The Khan Academy is attempting to do this for math education and has had good success on YouTube with very little in the way of production values. I don’t think we are far away from seeing massive success in the world of art/making education.

Get It Through Your Skull

These beautiful rings are a great example of matching subject matter and manufacturing process. 3D printing is not ready to replace injection molding. It really isn’t even close at this point, but its inherently distressed looks work perfectly for subject matter like skulls as these beautiful rings show. via @Make

Tagged as: Acrylonitrile butadiene styrene, Boston, Computer-aided design, Custom Manufacturing, Injection molding, Open source, YouTube