DorkbotPDX people doing strange things with electricity

Concept

This is a natural extension of the Exquisite Corpse form of drawing/painting/writing/film into electromechanical form.

Implementation

1 piece. 12 collaborators. 12 months.

The Philosophy

• Equal parts creativity and geekery!
• Do no harm.
  • Work of one collaborator should build upon and not degrade the work of the previous collaborators
  • Caveat: Unless absolutely necessary, which should be a very rare exception indeed.
• Assert an aesthetic!
  • Provoke emotion, stimulate many senses.
• Embrace raw, nontechnical materials.
  • Fabric, paint, repurposed tech, biological materials, scrap, found items, etc, etc.
• Be robust and make it work.
  • We achieve implementations that lasts a long time.
  • Interaction is swell, but don't require it (humans are unreliable)
• Document extensively and provoke inspiration.
  • But keep it private before the ceiling.

Constraints/Logistics

• Each collaborator should use approximately 1/12th (0.0833) of the available pre-setup (constrained) space.
• When the work is passed from one collaborator to the next, the moment is referred to as a "boundary".
• When the final contributor's work period has expired, the moment itself and the final work are referred to as the "ceiling".
• Each collaborator is given a fixed work time of exactly one month. Boundaries always occur on the first of the month.
• Prior to a boundary, upcoming collaborators must not view the work nor its documentation.
• At each boundary and at the ceiling, the work must:
  • Fit into a large plastic storage tote (of a size determined before the first boundary)
  • Be able to be set up, configured, and activated by a nontechnical person with brief instructions in under 10 minutes.
• After a boundary, previous collaborators must not contribute to the work (except for repair, which should be a very exceptional case indeed).
• All materials/components contributed to the work by all contributor are considered final and may not be reclaimed.
• The ceiling is equally owned by and credited to the collective contributors.

Schedule

• January : [COMPLETED: Jason Plumb]
• February: <IN PROGRESS>
• March: <RESERVED>
• April: <RESERVED>
• May: <RESERVED>
• June: <RESERVED>
• July: <RESERVED>
• August: <tbd>
• September: <tbd>
• October: <tbd>
• November: <tbd>
• December: <tbd>

FAQ

• How can I apply to participate?
  Send email to jason@noisybox.net with a short statement of interest and your preferred month.
• How do I know if I'm skilled enough?
  You are, don't worry. Basic skill with building electronics is encouraged, but you also have a month to refine your skills and get help.
• Can others help me?
  Sure, but they may not directly work on the exquisite corpse if they are past or future contributors. When getting assistance from others, you won't be disclosing details of the work.
• What if I'm not in Portland?
  Sorry, you must live in the Portland metro area (suburbs ok) to contribute.

The Styloid Process gallery has posted some setup and opening night photos from the recent Dorkbot group show:

Enjoy!
http://styloid-process.com/?page_id=202

Thanks again to Janiece for offering up her gallery and hosting, and a major thanks to everybody that contributed work for the show!

Tonight I...

• ...rode a bicycle across two bridges.
• ...was approached by a man and a woman (both strangers) and was told "we wish to join the cult".
• ...witnessed a man tapping a plastic pad connected to a tangle of circuits and wires and causing a drum sound to be played.
• ...saw a pair of multicolor robot eyeballs glowing on a tabletop
• ...witnessed a middle-aged man covered in a mass of glowing LEDs and EL wire.
• ...listened to the sound of a cello convolved with the impulse response from a wooden door.
• ...helped a woman field test a subversive, covert anti-television teddy bear implant prototype.
• ...watched a slot car adjust its speed in response to a computer's system load average.
• ...was in good company.

Dorkbot. <3

As promised, here's a video demonstration of the Ghetto Drum retrofit with USB MIDI:

So Paul hooked me up with a Teensy++ with a couple bad pins a few months ago and I ended up putting it to good use by retrofitting my Ghetto Drum system in order to support MIDI over USB. The project page has been updated and provides a few more details about the Frankenstein job.

Yesterday was the Pd interfacing with the worldworkshop and we had a blast! Thanks to everybody who came, and even bigger thanks to Alex, Jesse, and Don for pulling it together!

For posterity, I am attaching two of the Pd patches here that I was temporarily hosting elsewhere. If you didn't have a chance to attend, please feel free to check them out and play with them.

• fm_synth_patch.pd - The HID/joystick controlled FM synthesizer patch.
• netsend_recv.pd - The netsend/netreceive demo patch.

Hopefully soon we'll see some more technical info/specs on the midi monster, and then people can begin sharing info, ideas, and patches that they have created!

Feurig taught a great Eagle PCB workshop this weekend and had a solid turnout with a bunch of fast-learning board hackers! Kudos!

As Feurig was about to place a pizza order, an utterly surreal and beautifully sarcastic moment happened. This is the exchange...

feurig: Is anyone here a vegetarian or vegan?
<crickets chirping in silence>
me: wow, that's gotta be a first in Portland workshop history!
mykle: well, I'm allergic to starches!
heckler#2: I'm allergic to carbon!
<laugh riot>

The DorkbotPDX gallery opening at ON Gallery last Thursday (First Thursday) was a smash hit.

I've posted some photos from the event (or click the above), but of course they don't do it justice. Live beats Memorex! Hooray!

         ___                            ____       _
        / _ \   _ __    ___   _ __     |  _ \   __| |
       | | | | | '_ \  / _ \ | '_ \    | |_) | / _` |
       | |_| | | |_) ||  __/ | | | |   |  __/ | (_| |
        \___/  | .__/  \___| |_| |_|   |_|     \__,_|
               |_|
 __        __      [/~]      _            _         [bang(
 \ \      / /  ___    _ __ | | __  ___  | |__     ___    _ __
  \ \ /\ / /  / _ \  | '__|| |/ / / __| | '_ \   / _ \  | '_ \
   \ V  V /  | (_) | | |   |   <  \__ \ | | | | | (_) | | |_) |
    \_/\_/    \___/  |_|   |_|\_\ |___/ |_| |_|  \___/  | .__/
                                                        |_|

                 THIS SUNDAY - Aug 16th - 1-5pm @ PNCA rm 205
 [pd(          //~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~\\
  |   [you(   ///                                           \\\
  |  /        ///  Hi.  DorkbotPDX would like to welcome    \\\
 [+ ]         ///  you to an OPEN Pd workshop.  This is a   \\\
  |           ///  4-hour open workshop in which you can    \\\
 [creative]   ///  bring any project you like to hack on    \\\
  |           ///  and share ideas and get help.  All       \\\
 [outlet]     ///  projects are welcome, but we will be     \\\
              ///  focusing on Pure Data (Pd).              \\\
              ///                                           \\\
              ///  The workshop is intended to be a         \\\
              ///  collaborative effort -- there is no      \\\
              ///  curriculum, the cost is FREE, and you    \\\
   [+]        ///  may come and go as you like.             \\\
              ///                                           \\\
              ///  For the best workshop experience, bring  \\\
              ///  a laptop with Pd preinstalled and as     \\\
              ///  much or as little gear as you can carry! \\\
              ///                                           \\\
        [*~]  ///  http://dorkbotpdx.org/20090816_openpd    \\\
              ///  http://tinyurl.com/pnca-pdx <- map       \\\
              ///                                           \\\
               \\-------------------------------------------//

             people doing strange things with pd and electricity
   [dac~]