A Slightly Better Representation Of The Folddown (though Still Missing Many Components). Beam (not Shown)

Aaron with our main beam, taped but not yet glued up. streetlightchanger

Process of the folddown desk, focusing on the hinges. I got some sapele for the hinges that will contrast with the plywood. These shots show the color that pops out of wood after it is milled down. The top shot shows the 3 piece sapele hinge stock. Also shown is the miter plywood box that will form the crossbeam of the desk.

Print project. "Client" request: something that prevents pencils from falling to the bottom of her bag. Solution came in the form of magnetic pin on bag (with decorative seal backing) and a ring on the pencil to hold another magnet. After a few prints we got just the right dimensions to fit magnet and pencil, then epoxied in the magnets. Also made a ring for a dry erase marker because the screws on the whiteboard of our storage unit are magnetic.

Potential circuit for the on/off of the "smartphone opera house" lights. You could power the whole stand off of the 5V iPhone USB cable, taking a parallel path for the LEDs and the phone charger.

Dead center in the schematic is a relay that would control power to the LEDs. The relay could be pulled by some sort of signal from the iPhone's USB jack (the line coming from top left). I kind of hope that the iPhone sends some momentary Tx signal on the USB when it wakes up for an alarm but this is an assumption; its hard to find information on an Apple product. In any case, assuming some kind of transient signal could be pulled off of the iPhone the relay would be pulled closed and then self-latch, keeping the LEDs on. In order to manually turn the lights on and off, a double pole, double throw switch (ignore the SPDT label) could be used (which is shown as two separate switches, 1 and 2). To turn off the lights after the phone has turned them on you would turn the lights manually on, connecting 1 and disconnecting 2, then back to off, which would momentarily break the self-latch circuit.    

Mega update: after breadboarding up the latch circuit I found it would not toggle with a finger contact due to the high impedance of fingers. So step one was tracking down some 10MΩ resistors to up the impedance of the the whole thing. I decided that to keep the final assembly small I would do a “dead bug” circuit rather than a board. Next, I made some touch contacts out of copper shim—antennae for my bug. The process photos really illustrate the technique’s namesake. My first dead bug circuit came out successful, but it is quite a tedious method. Only recommended if you have a few zen hours to burn. Next, I cut my newly procured Mylar sheet into the appropriate sizes to create the body. Because I had a large sheet I upped the size of the largest cut above 8.5x11, which had always looked a bit anemic. I also glued up my scrap base: a glass sheet (carefully!) extracted from the glass scrap and some scrap plywood from the shelving project. Really I think they came away with a nicely complimentary color palate for being found materials.

Quick sworks of a potential group table. Tri, top, and side views. streetlightchanger 

Prototyping a digital latch for the old light-cum-paper project. After I made a space heater out of NANDs I ended up using two inverters and some resistors and capacitors for debouncing a la the last schematic in "Circuits B" here: http://www.talkingelectronics.com/projects/TouchSwitch/TouchSwitch-1.html

Process shots of the group table project.

From frame to frame-with-back to frame-with-back-and-shelves. And level shelves at that! Next step: slapping those hinges on. atlasdesignstudio benbasseches bradherz pgolyski

Divider storage in action.

A mobile divider benbasseches captainwhiskeycadillac bradherz atlasdesignstudio