MAKE Magazine

In This Issue... 3D renderings of the Mandelbrot set New in the Maker Shed: Microbe Motel kit Science through graphic novels Tiny solar-powered brass engine in a wineglass Maker Shed kiosks at Fry's New hackerspace in Chicagoland: Workshop 88 Mint tin electronics dev kit packs the essentials Olympus BioScapes competition winners More Recent Articles

A big Keanu "Whoa" over these gorgeous 3D renderings of fractals. The article offers a fascinating back story about the 20-year quest to adequately display a Mandelbulb, such a 3D analog rendering of a Mandelbrot set.

The Unraveling of the Real 3D Mandelbrot

Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in Science | Digg this!

The Microbe Motel is the grossest, smelliest, nastiest science kit we've ever offered. Ever! Other than some common household items, the Microbe Motel includes everything you need to grow colorful, stinky, colonies of household germs, bacteria, molds, and maybe even a fungus or two. Don't worry, you can kill them when you're finished.

Here are just a few of the experiments and projects you can do with the MAKE Microbe Motel Kit.

• Are dogs' mouths really cleaner than human mouths? Culture bacteria from your mouth and your dog's mouth to find out.
• Is the average toilet bowl really cleaner than the average kitchen sink? Find out by swabbing both and culturing the bacteria.
• Find the grungiest areas in your home by swabbing and culturing your computer keyboard, television remote, telephone, etc.
• Is money really as filthy as your grandmother told you? Find out.

More:

Are you interested in Science? Don't forget to check out all the other experiments in the Make: Science Room.

Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in Maker Shed Store | Digg this!

Science Friday's "Science Through Graphic Novels"... Great interview(s)! Using graphic novels to teach science...

In this segment, we'll take a look at two graphic novels that approach science from a different direction. One tackles Darwin's 'Origin of Species,' while the other deals with the life and ideas of philosopher and mathematician Bertrand Russell.

Michael Keller - Journalist, Author, "Charles Darwin's On The Origin Of Species: A Graphic Adaptation" (Rodale Books, 2009)

Apostolos Doxiadis - Co-author, "Logicomix: An Epic Search For Truth" (Bloomsbury, 2009)

Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in Arts | Digg this!

This is the work of Szymon Klimek, who has been honored by the Internet Craftsmanship Museum. [via The Automata / Automaton Blog]

Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in Makers | Digg this!

We're ecstatic about the fact that we now have Maker Shed kiosks, with magazines, books, and electronics kits, in several California Fry's stores. We think this is big news, not only for Maker Media, but for all indie makers -- a major retail chain is now giving small kit-makers this level of exposure. And, we think it's particularly cool that we designed and built these kiosks in-house, and even personally delivered them to the stores! What other publisher could claim that?

Here, Assoc. Publisher and General Manager of Maker retail, Dan Woods explains more:

Maker Shed kiosks are now installed in four of Fry's largest superstores. Each kiosk merchandises current and back issues of MAKE, Make: Project books, and kits, with an emphasis on maker-made kits produced by indie makers like Limor Fried's MintyBoost, Mitch Altman's Brain Machine, Ken Murphy's Blinky Bugs, Dale Wheat's Tiny Cylon and Wee Blinky kits, and Amy Parness and Ariel Churi's DIY Design Electronics kits. This indie maker angle was a really important selling point to Fry's. The kiosk's themselves are all-MAKE in their design and construction. The challenge was to create a merchandising/branding kiosk that could show off maker-made kits, as well as our books and magazines, all in a 2' X 2' footprint. The design we came up with incorporates the Maker Faire workbench framing as the internal structure, refurbished fence boards from West Sonoma, and some nicely weathered corrugated shed aluminum that was locally salvaged. The result is a nice combination of weathered shed and repurposed industrial tubing. They're uniquely MAKE, and Fry's is ecstatic. In fact, they were even trucked down and setup by Heather (Harmon-Cochran) and Rob (Bullington) in one day.

These are the stores that currently have kiosks. (San Diego will be set up by Fry's staff next week)

San Diego, CA
9825 Stonecrest Boulevard
(858) 514-4500

San Jose, CA
550 E. Brokaw Road
(408) 487-1000

Fremont, CA
43800 Osgood Road
(510) 252-5300

Sunnyvale, CA
1077 East Arques Avenue
(408) 617-1300

Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in Maker Shed Store | Digg this!

Good news for those in Chicagoland! Planning is underway to form Workshop 88, a hackerspace in the west suburbs of Chicago. Here's your chance to get in on the ground floor!

We're currently in the planning stage, and we're looking for interested people in the area to help us get started. We're holding bi-weekly meetings Mondays at 6:30 until we're ready to rent some space and move in. The first meeting is this Monday, November 23, at the Boilerhouse Cafe, on the campus of North Central College in Naperville (29 N Loomis St Naperville, IL 60540).

Some of the things we'll be discussing:

• Legal structure of the hackerspace
• Membership structure and guidelines
• Work that still needs to be done to build out our online presence
• Current projects

This information is also available on our blog, at http://blog.workshop88.com. Updates and meeting notices will be posted there, as well as on Twitter at http://twitter.com/Workshop88. For additional information, we have a mailing list at info@workshop88.com.

Workshop 88 Planning Meeting
Monday, November 23, 2009, 6:30pm
Boilerhouse Cafe
29 N Loomis St, Naperville, IL 60540

Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in Events | Digg this!

From the MAKE Flickr pool

Once you've caught the 'electronics bug', spending time away from the workbench/lab can seem an unpleasant prospect. Luckily, one can carry on learning and experimenting with a minimal amount of hardware. Nick shares his own recipe for ultra-compact electronics prototyping - the Altoids Tin Electronics Lab

This is a small electronics lab in an altoids tin. It contains nearly everything to work on small projects, such as a breadboard, components (including several ICs), and a adjustable power supply. The power supply is a simple LM317 circuit, with the 317's metal tab cut off to make it fit.

For details, check out Nick's essential part list. I'm guessing quite a few of us have mobile kits along these lines. Share pics of your setup via the MAKE Flickr pool - we'd love to see 'em!

Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in Electronics | Digg this!

Olympus BioScapes competition winners, amazing photos!

Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in Imaging | Digg this!