I'm on the cutting edge!
So, a few weeks ago, Agent Em and I went on a hiking trip on Catalina Island. It was pretty sweet.
Hiking 7 miles with a 40 pound pack on your back is a great way to break up the monotony of sitting around, and since every ounce of weight feels exponentially heavier with each quarter mile, you don't tend to have the luxury of an iPod. Those little suckers are heavy. Not to mention - it would be pretty contrary to the idea of hiking to go plugging-in on the trail. Point-being, you talk a lot when you hike.
Anyway, somewhere along the way - Em and I started talking about a widget. Basically inventing-while-hiking. Nothing like a little bit of spatial-reasoning to spice up the trail!
This widget is pretty great - no, I'm not going to tell you what it is, there's a long tradition of paranoid inventors and there's probably a law that says if you talk about something in a public forum before you patent it, it becomes public domain and you get nothing. Nothing!
So I start wondering how to go about making this widget. It's pretty simple. It could be plastic or metal. But how do you get it out of your head? As it turns out; while you're camping, you can't.
Once home, I drew out a cross section of said-widget. I figured that the first thing to do was to make a diagram. Then I realized that some sort of 3D drawing program would allow me to virtually 'build' a widget. I vaguely know how to use these types of programs, so I set about finding a free CAD/CAM design-a-widget program to download.
What I found rocked me socks off.
emachineshop.com is a company that provides a very intuitive 3D modeling program for free. But they take it a step further. Once you design a thing, you can click on a button and ORDER it. Just like that. Out of any material that's compatible with your design - and they have a whole list of materials, from different grades and colors of aluminum to teak to Pyrex.
The prices are pretty reasonable too. If you want one of your pieces, it's going to be a little pricey. But the cost drops drastically as you order in volume.
So, YESTERDAY, I get me fresh new copy of WIRED magazine only to discover an entire article about the startling trend of personalized fabrication and surprise surprise, the author uses emachineshop.com to produce a clear, Lexan body for his new electric guitar prototype.
I don't know about you, but I geek out knowing that through my own devices, I discovered something radass that goes on to grace the pages of WIRED.
But then, that's me.
Hiking 7 miles with a 40 pound pack on your back is a great way to break up the monotony of sitting around, and since every ounce of weight feels exponentially heavier with each quarter mile, you don't tend to have the luxury of an iPod. Those little suckers are heavy. Not to mention - it would be pretty contrary to the idea of hiking to go plugging-in on the trail. Point-being, you talk a lot when you hike.
Anyway, somewhere along the way - Em and I started talking about a widget. Basically inventing-while-hiking. Nothing like a little bit of spatial-reasoning to spice up the trail!
This widget is pretty great - no, I'm not going to tell you what it is, there's a long tradition of paranoid inventors and there's probably a law that says if you talk about something in a public forum before you patent it, it becomes public domain and you get nothing. Nothing!
So I start wondering how to go about making this widget. It's pretty simple. It could be plastic or metal. But how do you get it out of your head? As it turns out; while you're camping, you can't.
Once home, I drew out a cross section of said-widget. I figured that the first thing to do was to make a diagram. Then I realized that some sort of 3D drawing program would allow me to virtually 'build' a widget. I vaguely know how to use these types of programs, so I set about finding a free CAD/CAM design-a-widget program to download.
What I found rocked me socks off.
emachineshop.com is a company that provides a very intuitive 3D modeling program for free. But they take it a step further. Once you design a thing, you can click on a button and ORDER it. Just like that. Out of any material that's compatible with your design - and they have a whole list of materials, from different grades and colors of aluminum to teak to Pyrex.
The prices are pretty reasonable too. If you want one of your pieces, it's going to be a little pricey. But the cost drops drastically as you order in volume.
So, YESTERDAY, I get me fresh new copy of WIRED magazine only to discover an entire article about the startling trend of personalized fabrication and surprise surprise, the author uses emachineshop.com to produce a clear, Lexan body for his new electric guitar prototype.
I don't know about you, but I geek out knowing that through my own devices, I discovered something radass that goes on to grace the pages of WIRED.
But then, that's me.
posted by Noah @ 8:33 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home