Dutch Design Week – Part 1 October 31

The Design Academy Eindhoven graduation show.

One of the main events during Dutch Design Week was the graduation show for the Design Academy. The exhibit featured 131 graduating students from eight undergraduate departments and two masters programs. You can find plenty more information on the official website for the show.

The show was huge and covered two floors of the academy with several large rooms each. In the several hours it took me to make it through, I picked some of my favorite projects to share.

Check out the projects after the jump!

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Posted in Design, Events, Functional Art + Objects, Furniture + Lighting, Taylor Gilbert by Taylor Gilbert | Comments are off for this post

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Halloween and Laser Cutting October 31

The Laser Cutter Roundup — a weekly dose of laser-cut love: #1

Happy Halloween Ponoko readers; the blog has a treat! In the summer of ‘09 I came across The Laser Cutter, a blog by architecture student Sam Tanis. With Sam posting new photos on an almost daily basis of lasercut projects found all over the web, I would sometimes think “If only we could have ALL of that awesome stuff on OUR blog.”

So one day, I just asked. And today it’s my pleasure to introduce Sam Tanis and his first weekly post, ‘The Laser Cutter Round Up’. Every Sunday Sam will share the latest laser cut inspiration from his blog (and if you can’t wait until Sunday, be sure to check out Sam’s blog HERE).

Everyone, say hello to Sam!

(above: laser etched jack-o-lantern from Riley Porter)

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This is the first Laser Cutter Roundup collecting the weeks post from The Laser Cutter (TLC) a blog devoted all things laser cut.

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Posted in Laser Cutting, Sam Tanis by Sam | Comments are off for this post

Make your own stuff using: Laser Cutting

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Ponoko Crafters in Wellington October 31

Craft markets are nothing new to Ponoko users, not even in New Zealand.

A few months back we took note of Ponoko makers at the Craft2.0 fair, in Wellington.  This weekend saw the biggest yet Craft2.0 and featured quite a few Ponoko users.

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Posted in Events, Maker Stories, Yana Skaler by yana | Comments are off for this post

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Automatypewriter October 31

Arduino controlled typewriter can send and receive text

Interactive fiction leaps forward into the 21st century thanks to Canadian tinkerer Jonathan Guberman. Expanding on some of the ideas behind the USB Typewriter project, he has built into a venerable electronic typewriter the ability to both send and receive text.

An Arduino board makes sense of the multilayered solenoid array that triggers the keys. Information is transferred to and from a nearby computer via USB, and laser cut acrylic guides help keep the myriad of lines running out to the keys from getting tangled.

This incarnation of the Automatypewriter has been rigged to play Zork, the legendary stalwart of the Interactive Fiction genre. For those who don’t have an arduino powered mechanical typewriter of their own, do not despair – you can fire up Zork right here inside your browser.

A detailed description of the project appears on Jonathan’s blog, including schematics for the solenoid control board. Team this up with Modkit + Ponoko + SparkFun and you’ll soon be losing yourself in mechanical retro gaming adventure land.

Automatypewriter via BoingBoing

Posted in Electronics + Robotics, Guy Blashki, Inventions, Programming by Guy Blashki | Comments are off for this post

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    Modkit + Ponoko + SparkFun = Easier than ever

Wellington Makers Meetup October 31

Kia ora! We’re excited to be hosting the first Wellington Makers Meetup at our New Zealand offices, and would love you to join us.

Wednesday November 10th, 6.30pm – 8pm

Ponoko NZ Office
Level 1
27 Dixon Street
Wellington

RSVP HERE

This new meetup group in the windy city is dedicated to digital fabrication and digital making, which as you know is what we at Ponoko are all about.

If you are interested in making extraordinary things, then come along! This is also an opportunity for people in the Wellington region to meet other makers and Ponoko creators, and have any questions you might have answered in person.

The theme for our November meetup will be ‘Holiday Making’ – decoration ideas for Christmas, as well as great ideas for Ponoko-made presents for your friends and family.

Our co-founder and CEO Dave ten Have will speak, as will Richard Fortune and Dave Keyes, who have both made with Ponoko before and are keen to share their experiences.

You can examine our material samples, be inspired by ideas of custom awesomeness that you can impress others with, and we’ll be happy to give feedback on any designs you’re working on. You can also check out the laser in operation, and watch as it works its magic on some custom-made Christmas decorations.

SHARE AN IDEA & BE IN TO WIN $50 MAKING
Bring along a Christmas decoration in EPS format, drop your name in the box and you could be in to win a $50 Ponoko voucher! We’ll draw the winning design at the end of the night.

If there’s anything in particular you’d love to see at this meetup or future ones, don’t hesitate to let us know.

Hope to see you there!

Posted in Catherine F-D, Ponoko News by catherine | Comments are off for this post

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Frank turns five October 31

CNC cutter joins in the celebrations

IMG_2136

It’s nice to see the machines that do so much hard work for us receiving a bit of love in return for their efforts.

The guys over at the Bay Area’s Because We Can recently celebrated five productive years with “Frank” in true CNC style.

After blowing out his own candles, he proceeded to cut the cake into perfect squares, one for each of the attending guests at the company’s open house event.

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Posted in CNC Routing, Guy Blashki by Guy Blashki | Comments are off for this post

Make your own stuff using: CNC Routing

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How to raise 202% of what you need for your next DIY project October 30

Join the Personal Factory Movement and see how a Ponoko customer used Kickstarter to fund their ‘DNA Xerox machine’.



OpenPCR more than doubled their funding goal!

Leave us your email and learn the best way to use Kickstarter for your next creative project.

You’ll also be notified the moment we launch the next generation of the world’s first Personal Factory – something that will revolutionize the future of products.

Posted in Ponoko News by mjdimond | Comments are off for this post

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How to Sell Products to Major Retailers Webinar is Tomorrow! October 29

Just a quick reminder…if you would like to learn everything you ever wanted to know about selling your products to major retailers, online retailers, small retailers and catalogs,  then please join us for a FREE 2 HOUR WEBINAR hosted by Ponoko on Saturday, October 3o, from 2-4pm PST!

Space is limited.

Reserve your Webinar seat now at:

https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/546031472

To Your Success,
Karen Waksman

About the Webinar Organizer:  Karen Waksman (http://www.productforprofit.com) is a Successful Manufacturer’s Rep turned Author, Speaker and Consultant. She has written a step-by-step guide called ‘How To Sell Your Product, Invention or Craft to Major Retailers…No Sales Experience or Existing Buyer Relationships Required!’

Check out my previous blog posts for more info:

http://blog.ponoko.com/2010/08/25/can-i-really-sell-my-new-products-to-major-retailers/

http://blog.ponoko.com/2010/08/09/selling-to-major-retailers/

Posted in Events, Ponoko News by Karen | Comments are off for this post

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These Scarves Show off What Digital Printing is All About October 29

the Spring/Summer 2011 collection from Charlotte Linton


Traditional fabric printing involves a limited color palette. Whether it’s block printing or screen printing, more colors always means more cost.

One of the greatest thing about digital textile printing is that designs can have unlimited colors at the same cost as a single color. Yet designers using digital fabric printing still cling to flat designs with a few, flat colors.

Let Charlotte Linton show you how it’s done.

above: Mineralogy

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Posted in Digital Fabric Printing, Fashion + Textiles, Kristen Turner by Kristen Turner | Comments are off for this post

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Unbox, Build, Print — Review of the RepMan 3.1 3D Printer October 28

3D Printers Australia sets up a RepMan Kit

3D Printers Australia brings “all the best information from the world wide 3D Printing industry to the Australian industry”.

They’ve got a blog with lots of 3D printing videos, and their most recent post is a review of the RepMan 3.1. In their conclusion, the two guys report “All up the RapMan took us a good 12 hours to assemble with 2 people working on it but once it was complete it was up and running and printing decent parts with out any adjustment with factory settings. That in itself says a lot.”

“The build process is a little more complicated than a Makerbot mainly due to the scaffold frame design however its not any harder, it just takes more time to assemble. …The Makerbot cupcake CNC is around half the price of the RapMan but your only getting a 1/4 of the build size so if you want to print parts bigger than 100 x 100mm its worth having a good look at a RapMan.”

If you’re thinking of getting your own 3D printer, be sure to check out 3D Printers Australia’s full review. And don’t miss the Step By Step Guide to Building a MakerBot Cucpake CNC 3D Printer.

Posted in 3D Printing, Various How-To by Kristen Turner | Comments are off for this post

Make your own stuff using: 3D Printing

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