Jennifer Whalen wanted a horse that could walk around and so she went and found a Muybridge animation from the 1870’s and traced the shapes in inkscape to create a design. Then she lasercut the shapes and we used istopmotion to make them walk all over her… and a buffalo to walk all over Bre.

The wikipedia entry for Muybridge is very colorful and worth a read!

If you get the bug to make physical animations, you can start with these designs! Go download the horse and buffalo designs on thingiverse!

You can download a big hd file here or a smaller iphone sized file. If you subscribe in iTunes you can get the videos downloaded automatically!

I’m thrilled to find out that iTunes is featuring my podcast! If you haven’t subscribed in iTunes, it may be the easiest way to stay up to date with the Things video podcast. Thanks iTunes!

Are you worried about keeping your laptop safe during travel? Cathy Moore creates laptop envelopes. She originally made one for her daughter and now she finds all sorts of fantastic fabric and makes them. They’ve got quilting in them to pad them.

Cathy is e verywhere. You can find her on Youtube, Flickr, her blog, and you can buy her things in her Etsy shop!

Here’s an iphone compatible file that automatically get’s picked up by those who subscribe in iTunes and here’s a giant HD file for those of you who are into sweet pixel goodness.

Sign Up For The Class!

If you didn’t get a chance to sign up for Saturday’s class, on Sunday, November 23nd, you can harness the power of an Eplilog 35 Watt Laser! In this class you’ll learn everything you need to know to make the ideas in your head become a reality with a laser.

In this two hour class, we’ll walk through all the steps from idea to pressing the “go” button on the laser. We’ll cover safety and basic design skills in Inkscape, the open source vector editor and you’ll learn how to do a burninate test to find out if something is laserable.

After learning the basics, each student will create their own design and lasercut it on the laser! A $10 lab fee is included in the ticket price and covers 12″ x 12″ of 1/8″ acrylic and time on the laser cutter to cut and etch it. Bring a laptop if you’ve got one and design ideas for your own holiday decorations.

Even though this class doesn’t start insanely early, I will be providing bagels and cream cheese. Give me a heads up if you are a vegan and I’ll make sure to have some jam or tofu cream cheese!

Before the internet, people got their news over the wire by using the magical and mechanical powers of the teletype. Adam Mayer walks us through the workings of this Model 15 teletype he restored.

Adam recently went on a teletype tirade on twitter. Follow him at http://twitter.com/phooky to get interesting technical info about all sorts of things!

Here’s the iPhone compatible video and the luscious hd video!

If you’re in the NYC area and you’ve got a thing, I’ll come visit you and shoot a video! Just drop me an email. I’m only in town until the end of the month so if you’ve been thinking about it, now is the time!

For the last two weeks Thingiverse has been in stealth mode. Zach Hoeken and I schemed it up and he’s been coding like crazy to bring it to life. Invite your friends to the thingiverse and share the universe of things with folks you know!

Fred over at Creative Commons wrote up a very nice article about Thingiverse!

Thingiverse is an “object sharing” site that enables anyone to upload the schematics, designs, and images for their projects. Users can then download and reuse the work in their projects using their own laser cutters, 3D printers, and analog tools. Think of it as a Flickr for the Maker set.

Besides implementing our licenses, Bre and Zach have also gone the distance and allowed users to license works under the GNU GPL, LGPL, and BSD licenses, as well as allowing them to release works into the public domain. Thingiverse uses our license wrappers for each of these licenses thereby enabling automatic indexing by machines like search engines.

Pushing the envelope even further, Thingiverse also fully implements our RDFa specification (just take a look at the source of any page with a CC license to see RDFa in action) for expressing licensing and authorship information on the semantic web. This means that aside from telling machines that a work is licensed under CC, Thingiverse also tells machines the title of a work, its author, and other interesting semantic information.

If you’re looking for a fantastic example of how to implement the commons on a platform designed for sharing creativity, look no further than Thingiverse.

Thanks Fred! We’ll keep doing our best to make this a great place to share things!

You know when you had your notes taken from you by the teacher and read aloud in class? If you’d had one of Nick’s Polyalphabetic Substitution Cypher Slide Rules (PASCSR) you could have avoided that!

A Caesar cipher is any cipher where you shift the alphabet a certain number of letters. In WWII, they used slide rules like these to encrypt and decrypt what were called “One Time Pad” messages, where the key was a long random string of letters and numbers that told you how far to shift the alphabet to decrypt the message.

In this example, Nick used the Vigenere method, which is between the OTP (One-Time Password) and a Caesar cipher. The key is a fixed length (LOLCATS), and each letter of the key tells us where to shift our alphabet so we can decode the message. You can encode messages in the same way!

Nick is a founding member of HACDC, the hacker space in DC and I consider him to be the “Johnny Appleseed” of hacker spaces!

By subscribing in itunes, you can get all the videos delivered to you in an iPhone compatible format. Here’s the iphone video file or you can watch this HD file!

Today’s video also coincides with the launch of the Thingiverse. Zach Hoeken and I created a website where you can share your things. Check out Nick’s PASCSR plans on the Thingiverse. If you’ve got object files, I invite you to share them in the Thingiverse!

Making these Things videos is making me very happy and having you watch them makes it worth all the work it takes me to make them.

I’m having 100 Things Tshirts made by my friend 1aeon. He’s my favorite tshirt artist and they are going to be good. They’ll be hand printed and special. I’ll put them up for sale as soon as they are done.

Thank you for watching, thank you for commenting, and thank you for spreading the word.

I promised myself I would make a video every day for the month of November and it’s been the best thing I’ve done all year.

Here’s the iphone compatible file and the HD file and here’s the iTunes subscribe link if you want to get them all automatically.

Because I think it’s interesting and because you might find it interesting, here are the video statistics for the last two weeks.

I’ve been wanting to go to the ocean and stick my finger in it and taste it, so today I went to the Far Rockaways. It was windy, raw, desolate, and satisfying. You can get there on the subway too.

(click through and press all sizes to be able to read my walking notes)

My pal Diana Eng showed up with a bottle of wine, but know corkscrew. How do you open a bottle of wine in the workshop? With a drill, screw, vise-grip, and a broom-handle! Yay for levers!

I normally embed the blip.tv flash video, but this video is a little fussy, I had it set to 60 frames a second which makes it record at 320×240 and so you get the youtube version of it. I actually upload all my videos to my youtube channel so folks can find them there. You can check them out and subscribe if you spend any time there!

While working on the drawbot, I wanted to make breakfast for my friends. Luckily I had just the right tool for the job! Here is a regular old video file. (I have to link to the video file in every post so iTunes sees it)

Do you long to exterminate a friend with cuddly goodness? Deeanna created this friendly Dalek from a pattern on Ravelry to give to as a gift.

Want to make your own “Extermiknit”? Check out penwiper’s free pattern!

You can download this ipod sized video file (which you can also get by subscribing in iTunes) or you can watch this hd video file full of pixels!

Needlepoint portraiture without a thimble has the highest thumb pain to awesomeness quotient. Megan Fenton breaks it on down for us and shares her amazing needlepoint project with us.

Ok, subscribing in iTunes will now bring you the iphone/ipod compatible video file and I’m working on getting an hd iTunes feed but until then, you’ll just have to go get the big luscious hd video file at the wonderful blip.tv.

Raphael Abrams and Max explore the smelly process of high voltage cooking!

Feel free to subscribe in iTunes to get all these videos delivered automagically. You can also watch electricity jump up wires in a super HD video file and with a file for your iphone!

Also, huge thanks to the folks who have left such awesome reviews in iTunes. If you haven’t done so, I still need more! Leave reviews of this podcast here!

Bonus: This isn’t the first time these two have cooked with the jacobs ladder.

This week I’m taking my screwdriver to the robopet. What will I find inside Mark Tilden’s robotic dog?

Thanks goes out to Danger’s Closet for donating the beast.

Now iPhone Compatible! Here’s a big HD video file link and an iPhone video file link! Subscribe in iTunes to make it easy. I’m making a video every day of November! Also thanks to the folks who have left reviews on iTunes. I appreciate it!

mark tilden's robopet in skeletal form

This documentation of robopet evolution is awesome! It really gives you an idea how Mark Tilden, one of my robotics heroes, thought through it.

The big trak was a toy I lusted after as a kid. You could program it to go into the kitchen have your brother put an apple in it’s dump truck wagon and turn around and bring it back to you.

This came out in 1979 and with infinite money I would make a lifesize big trak out of a 1988 honda civic.

Check out this wonderful take apart of a big trak.

My daily video journey continues. Today I show how to create a flying spaghetti monster on the lazzzor. I will be teaching how to do this in the class I will be teaching at NYCR!

If you’re feeling friendly and would like to leave a review of this podcast, you can leave a review on iTunes! This iPhone video file will sync with your iphone of ipod. Or if you like you can examine all the pixels in luscious HD.

This video is inspiring me at the moment.

Sign Up For The Class!

On Saturday, November 22nd, you can harness the power of an Eplilog 35 Watt Laser! In this class you’ll learn everything you need to know to make the ideas in your head become a reality with a laser.

In this two hour class, we’ll walk through all the steps from idea to pressing the “go” button on the laser. We’ll cover safety and basic design skills in Inkscape, the open source vector editor and you’ll learn how to do a burninate test to find out if something is laserable.

After learning the basics, each student will create their own design and lasercut it on the laser! A $10 lab fee is included in the ticket price and covers 12″ x 12″ of 1/8″ acrylic and time on the laser cutter to cut and etch it. Bring a laptop if you’ve got one and design ideas for your own holiday decorations.

Because this class starts insanely early (10AM) I will also be providing bagels and cream cheese. Give me a heads up if you are a vegan and I’ll make sure to have some jam or tofu cream cheese!

Subscribe in iTunes

Jon Muller wanted a puzzle that could be done over and over again so he created this thing out of wooden cubes and magnets. It only goes together in one way, so far it takes first timers between 45 minutes and 2 hours to get it together!

Nice HD Video File

Kyle McDonald says, Leaving Termini in Rome, in 3D. Uses the parallel viewing technique en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stereoscopy Recorded on a single camera at 25 fps, with the right side delayed by one frame. Assuming the train was going 40 k/h, each frame is about 44 cm apart — a bit more than the width of human eyes, but not significant enough to destroy the effect.

You can do this for yourself so long as you separate the left/right with a delay that creates about the width between the human eyes between perspectives. As a rule of thumb, at 30 fps, 1 frame is approximately the distance in centimeters of your speed in kilometers/hour (10 km/h / 30 fps = 9.2 cm).

I’ve done a few experiments with stereo photos back when i was doing pinhole stuff. Now I just need a video 3D viewer!

Kristen O’Friel made this super clever haptic navigation device which can lea you around town just by leaning. Besides being insanely cool, it’s cute!

I’m making a video everyday this week. Today I’ve been working on learning how to make 3D models in Blender. It’s a brutal learning curve and I haven’t had time to make a things video so I popped up to my roof and made this video about my overflowing gutter.

Subscribe in iTunes

I recently lost my scarf and so I fired up the knitting machine and with the help of Kellbot and Diana Eng, I had a scarf in no time flat!

Wonderful HD Video File

Subscribe in iTunes

Eric Skiff’s back hurt and his neck was strained from hunching over his laptop. He needed to get it up off the table. Can he make his vision for a laptop stand a reality with a little help from a laser cutter?

(If you need an awesome steampunk-style portable laptop stand, Eric’s got the laptop stand for sale!)

Super HD Video File Here

Subscribe in iTunes

Eric Michaud needed a fork and he needed one bad if he was going to eat his ramen with any self respect. He whipped one up in QCAD and had one lazzzored by the time his ramen was done!

Eric is also starting up a hacker space in Chicago called the Pumping Station!

I’m having a great time making a video every day! If you haven’t checked out the other 4 videos I’ve made this month, check them out! You can find them here on my blog, on blip.tv, on vimeo, and on youtube! Of course for most people the easiest thing to do is to just subscribe in iTunes and get them automatically!

Sweet HD File

Subscribe in iTunes

So, you already know that I’m making videos like crazy this month. So far I’ve done three things videos. Today it’s “Take It Apart Tuesday” so I’m taking something apart!

George gave me a hard drive that’s dead. Rather than throw it out, I’m going to take it apart and see what I can salvage! To do this, I’m using a screwdriver with a  Mini Torx Screwdriver Set.

Luscious HD File.

Subscribe in iTunes

Adam Cecchetti wanted a chess set and he wanted it now. He got right to it and rapid prototyped one! He used inkscape to design it and a lasercutter to cut it out of acrylic.

Chess Set HD Video File

• Export a full resolution file from iMovie.
• Open it in quicktime pro and watch it one last time so I know I haven’t missed any editing flaws.
• Compress it by exporting an “appleTV” version of the video which gives me a nice M4V.
• Upload that to Tube Mogul and then crosspost to Blip, Youtube, Howcast, Google, and Yahoo.
• Manually upload to Vimeo and Facebook and Flickr since tubemogul crossposting doesn’t work for those. Also Tumblr!
• Write the post on my blog to go with the video.
• Grab the embed code and the video file permalink from blip.tv.
• Publish it on my blog and twitter about the blogpost. Through the magic of the internet, the post automatically shows up on my soup and the twitter automatically shows up as facebook message.  I include a subscription link to iTunes. There are lots of ways to subscribe to my videos, but that one is the easiest for the most people.
• I then try and tell a few friends about it when I’m done because I’ve just done a bunch of work and it’s nice to get some feedback. If you leave comments on my videos it makes me super happy.

So that’s my checklist. It takes a while! Let me know if you do anything different or have any questions about it or any ideas that I’m missing here!

Bill is a good friend of mine and he’s joining me in making a video every weekday in November. His series is called “Rock Star” and he’s starting out with this video: Women Love Voters!

Erica, who is the animator for Drawn By Pain, has a great tutorial here. She shows Erik Beck how make halo armor. It uses one of my favorite tools, a 3D unfolder called Pepakura!

Last night at midnight, my pals Phooky, X, Eric, and his brother Ian decided to build a robotic arm.

Phooky and Eric started working on the gripper, X started working on making the sanguino talk to 6 servos with an atari joystick, Ian did research and I started mocking parts up in Inkscape for the lasercutter. Our vision is to make a chess playing robot and when it’s done, we’ll publish all the files so you can make your own!

If you don’t like feeding your fish, why not make your own robotic fish using these plans?

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I’m going to be making a video weekday this month, but I’m kicking it off this weekend. Make sure to checkout yesterdays probe video.

Justin Day is CTO of Blip.tv by day and processing obsessed by night. Justin created the NYCResistor processing study group and wanted a project that everyone could collaborate on so he made the spooky box. It’s both a hardware and software project. He made a virtual box and a physical box so that you could program for it without having a physical box. There’s an arduino in it!

Check out the NYCResistor Wiki to learn more about the spooky box and stay tuned to the NYCResistor blog to learn about upcoming classes!

Spooky Box HD Video File

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For all of November, I’m going to be producing a video for every weekday! I’m kicking it off early with this video about Raphael Abrams probe thing!

Raphael Abrams of teuthis is one of those people who doesn’t sit around daydreaming projects up, he just does them. He was recently featured in Wired magazine and is a forerunner in the open source hardware movement.

We were recently chatting about digitizing human bodies and making 3D bodyscans and Raphael jumped into action, created a file to make some lasercut parts. Together with his acrylic bits and a stepper motor and an arcade button he made this probe.

Stay tuned for a follow up episode when he finishes the coffin sized XY platform and starts digitizing humans at an amazing 1 DPI!

This is the first video in a series of videos that I’m calling “Things” I’m going to be putting out a Things video everyday in November! Subscribe in iTunes to stay up to date and have the show downloaded automatically in iTunes

Update: if you want to subscribe using the feed, it’s here! http://brepettis.com/blog/feed/

Probe HD Video File

History Hacker, the TV show I created with JWM Productions for History is going to re-air on Wednesday November 12 at Noon and 6PM. It’s on the History website and you can program it into your tivo.

Only 300,000 people watched it the first time around. With approximately 300,000,000 people in the USA, that meas that only 1/1000 of the population has seen it. I’d really like it if 1/100 of the population would see it!

If you missed it the first time around because of the presidential debates, this is your chance to watch it! Please pass the word on to friends!

You are also invited to join the History Hacker facebook group if you like!

Last time I live twittered commentary and I’ll be doing that again! Follow me on Twitter to get the behind the scenes details!

We all want to live. When the zombies come, in order to live, we’ll have to pretend to die. Erik Beck joins me in this video to show you how to survive a zombie uprising. Don’t let the zombies eat you, Use make-up to blend in with them. Luxurious HD Zombie video download here.

Do sleep in a coffin, dislike the sunlight, and like really rare meat but lack the pointy teeth to really call yourself a vampire? Fret no longer! Eric Skiff and I have a video for you to help your vampire self esteem! Here’s a luscious blood dripping HD fang video!

Update: My pal Kosso made some fangs and made a video over at his site phreadz. Check out his !