Workshop: Intro to LilyPad

E-textiles, electro-craft, wearable electronics; it’s about taking technology and transforming it around your body, creating symbiosis. Helping technology meld seemlessly into the very fabric of our lives.

Whether you’re looking to augment the human condition or you’re more interested in the romantic ethereal glow of twinkly lights, you have to start somewhere.

LilyPad is a microcontroller system, a wearable version of the Arduino microcontroller (and equally as Open Source), with many accessory boards of sensors and actuators. It is designed to facilitate the development of wearables and e-textiles.

Using it is equal parts hardware, software, and craft. All the information you need to get started with it is available online. But sometimes you’d like a kick in the right direction, so we’re holding a series of LilyPad workshops, every two weeks, to do just that. You can sign up for just one, or all of the workshops. Whatever interests you.

Content;
The first workshop is for complete beginners; an introduction to the LilyPad system, from what the different parts of the board do, to some basic coding, getting data in, and turning on/off some lights. The only thing you’ll need to bring with you is a laptop with USB port, everything else is provided. (If you want to bring your own LilyPad components that’s great, just let us know when you’re booking and we’ll make sure you have everything you’ll need.)

Important: please bring your own laptop with USB port. Closer to the event you will receive instructions on how to install the programming environment.

Optional materials; Any LilyPad board (preferably the Protosnap), with light sensor, switches, and LEDs.
If you want to play with the LilyPad before buying, Protosnap boards can be provided for the duration of the workshop, but you’ll probably have to work in groups of at least two people.

When: Thursday, October 10th. From 7pm until 10pm.

Where: TOG.

Cost: €10 for non-members, €5 for members. (All proceeds go to support TOG.)

~~Please register through the contact form below the cut.~~

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Bubble Birdhouse

We have been working on projects that all went down really well at Maker Faire this year and will be working on over the coming months to improve as we go along.

One project that I worked on with another member is the Bubble Birdhouse.

2013-07-21 14.04.20

It all started with some messing/science trying to make bubbles from washing up liquid and seeing what components are needed for a good bubble. Then trying to replicate what the commercial machines can do but build your own. Once we had this almost cracked we worked to scale up the project as we did for street performers event. We learned that children like to stick fingers into every bubble that comes out of the machine, so we came up with solutions for this.

We put it 6 foot off the ground, this was a really amazing experience to see how children and adults are drawn to bubbles.

Next stage is to take it all apart and redesign it from scratch like every project; rebuild and improve as we go along.

If you want to see the Bubble Birdhouse in action check out the end of this news piece.

02/08/201308/08/2013

The TwitterKnitter

One of TOG’s projects for the Dublin Mini Maker Faire 2013. This 40 year old, entirely mechanical knitting machine was upgraded with servos, electronics and laser cut parts, and spent the day knitting tweets sent by attendees.

Empisal Knitmaster 321 — Originally designed to take knitting patterns from punchcards…

DMMFknitter — At the TOG stand at Dublin Mini Maker Faire

18/12/201219/12/2012

Review of The Arduino Starter Kit

During Maker Faire New York, Jeffrey and Robert were offered the opportunity to review the new official Arduino Starter Kit. We’ve had the kit now for over a month now and finally got a chance to properly review it.

The first thing you notice is that the retail packaging is beautiful. A simple cardboard box with elegant pictures of an Arduino and the kit’s components on the outside. Then on the inside the components are grouped into their own smaller gold coloured cardboard boxes.

Continue reading “Review of The Arduino Starter Kit”

23/05/2012

Workshops @ Rua Red

Robert and Jeffrey will be leading two workshops in RUA RED as part of the Glitch festival. Glitch runs from the 11th May until the 16th June. It hosts artists who utilise both virtual and real spaces to create their work with a a focus on Collective Intelligence , Immersive Technology and Open Source Technology.

Workshop 1 Soldering

This fun and hands on workshop will show you how to get started creating your own electronic creations. The workshop covers the basic techniques of soldering and how to make simple circuits. Participants will finish the workshop with a kit they can bring home.

Dates: Saturday 2nd June – 11am – 12.30pm & 1pm – 2.30pm

Cost: €5

Booking: http://ruared.ie/Soldering.html

Workshop 2 Arduino

Do you want to make things blink? Build interactive art? Construct robots to take over the world? Then Arduino is for you.

You don’t need to be a programmer or an electronics engineer just have an open mind.
You will start off using LED’s and LDR to make light bar graphs.
This workshop will give you the spring into the world of Arduino.

Dates: Saturday 9th June – 12pm – 3pm

Cost: €5

Booking: http://ruared.ie/Arduino.html

25/10/201126/10/2011

Arduino for Coders

Do you want to make things blink? Build interactive art? Construct robots to take over the world? The Arduino is for you. It’s intended for designers and hobbyists. It is an easy to use device made for real people. The Arduino will open the worldof physical computing to you.

This course starts at the beginning but will move at a fast pace and is designed for programmers. We will cover in detail the electronics required to get started with Arduino and explore how to read the Arduino code base.

This course will cover :

Basic electronics (Ohm Law, Breadboarding skills )
Digital Inputs / Output
Analog Inputs / Outputs
Microcontroller Communication

Continue reading “Arduino for Coders”