Category: Design

Open Clip Art Library

Need some clip art and just don’t want to plow through the Office download site, or maybe you haven’t partaken in the Redmond Kool-Aid and use Open Office but still want pretty clip art to liven up that boring sales report or add some flair to the TPS reports. Over at Open Clip Art Library you can find thousands of clips that are just waiting to be used in new and exciting ways! It’s all Public Domain and Creative Commons here my friend so take what you want and if your handy with the art supplies maybe you can contribute to the site.

Open Clip Art Library :: openclipart.org :: Drawing Together.

Lego Magnets

LEGO and magnets… Perfect!!!

"…gave us a set of Magz for Christmas and i noticed that the small magnets in the bar component of the toy looked like the right size to fit in the cylinder in the bottom of Lego bricks. I have scads of Lego but was lucky enough to get a bit of new Lego as a gift also. Tonight i put the two together."

[via MAKE]

Lego magnets on Zieak’s Blog

The Rolamite

Rolomite

I think I’ve seen something a bit like these in tape drives and floppy drives, but then again maybe not. A Rolamite is a metal tape and a set of rollers that have some simply fascinating properties, like almost no friction and a natural tendency to store energy. A fine example of a practical use is this letter scale. I wonder if this might have a use in robotics…

[via Boing Boing]

Frictionless Machines from Rollers & Bands – The Rolamite

All in One Microcontroller Kit

 Thames & Kosmos Computer systems engineering kit

If your looking for a nice turn key solution for learning microcontrollers this could be for you. The Thames & Kosmos Computer systems engineering kit has pretty much every thing you will need to get you started with electronics and microcontrollers:

  • microcontroller module
  • dual digital display module
  • 3 transistors
  • 7 light emitting diodes
  • motor
  • light sensor (light dependent resistor)
  • temperature sensor (negative temperature coefficient type)
  • potentiometer
  • microphone
  • buzzer
  • diodes
  • capacitors
  • resistors
  • switches
  • wires
  • contact clips
  • infrared interface device
  • USB to 9-pin serial adapter (RS-232 type)
  • software CD
  • portable case

You can pick one up from Amazon if you want.

[via All the best bits] 

Thames & Kosmos > Products > Microcontroller

DIY Cintiq LED Drawing Pad

DIY Cintiq LED Drawing Pad

Yeah, so why should you buy high tech toys when you can build your own? This is a very sweet project I hope to see other people try this as well.

"This is hybrid screen/graphics tablet which makes me drool. The price however makes me weep, £2000ish for the 20" version. They also do a thing called the PL at 17" for a more reasonable £500ish. Occasionally they appear on the site in their bargain basement ex-demo section. Still hard for me to justify though.

Then I had one of those "spang" moments. None of the tech involved is new and all is readily available second hand, it’s just a matter of putting it together. My Wacom at work will happily operate with the stylus off the surface, after that it’s just an LCD screen, right? Anyhow where’s the fun in just buying something?

Experiment – what depth does a tablet work to? Stack of paper says 9mm before accuracy starts to suffer noticeably. An LCD with an EL film backlight has to be thinner than that.

So here’s the challenge, What is the least amount of money I can build a Cintiq style device for?

[via MAKE] 

DIY Cintiq