Hello everyone! Welcome to the day of some of the awesome inventions I was able to see at this year’s Maker Faire Detroit!!!
Maker Faire Detroit is one of the largest Maker Faires in the country, and it does not disappoint in the shear volume of amazing amount of creative people and their inventions.
Maker Faire Detroit is at The Henry Ford, The Henry Ford in Dearborn, Mich., is an internationally-recognized cultural destination where stories and artifacts from 300 years of America’s history bring to life the accomplishments of ordinary and extraordinary individuals alike.
It offers a perfect backdrop for all with an open mind and the will to create, and in this post I will introduce just a few of these inspiring people that I had the honor to meet.
One of these amazing groups of presenters was A2ESK8 .
A2ESK8 was birthed with a passion for all things DIY and to combine a high level of functionality and style for DIY projects.
Every DIY eboard relies on components developed by many companies springing up to serve the market. These companies are developing batteries, writing code, engineering motor systems and figuring out pieces of technology at every point in between.
Our mission is to combine safety, reliability, art and design to inspire others to be part of a growing DIY community that will innovate the electric skateboard industry.
They are an amazing down to earth group of skaters that bring tech into truly amazing growing DIY community.
I also had time to get to know Tiny Circuits.
TinyCircuits is a maker of tiny open source electronics that let you create your own miniature electronic projects. Our main product is the TinyDuino – an Arduino compatible platform the size of a US Quarter. The TinyDuino platform is completely modular and works like tiny electronic LEGOs, so you can easily add complex functions, like GPS, WiFi, motor control or graphics displays to your projects just by plugging the expandable modules (called TinyShields).
We serve the Maker community and are Maker’s ourselves – we make all TinyCircuits products in our factory in Akron, Ohio, USA, and take great care to make sure the products we ship out are the highest quality.
Some of the smallest arcade systems I’ve ever seen, we will be seeing big things do come in small packages from this company in the future.
Another person that was there to share the joys of DIY and use of ones imagination was Michael Evens of Pish Posh.TV.
Mike is a web and mobile app developer, previous Code for America captain and founder of the Detroit brigade. Mostly interested in civic development challenges he also spends time helping tech literacy by teaching programing with Grand Circus Detroit and producing DIY shows at pishposh.tv.
Mike was a part of the team behind forrst.com, an online community for designers and developers to share projects and get detailed feedback. While there he also started the Forrst Podcast along with co-host Kenneth Love; the 155 episodes provided a daily resource for design and development news.
Right now Mike’s biggest interest is with physical computing, which entails seeing what projects and issues can be solved with 3d printers, arduino microcontrollers, and raspberry pi.
With so much going on it was nice to feel safe there was an awesome force keeping an eye on the crowds and rebels in line. There was a good time to be had by all thanks to their bravery.
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And even when faced with a T shirt shooting MegaBots they did not back down 🙂
On to more people like this group that gave cool demo of what they can do together.
AndyMark develops, manufactures, and distributes mechanical and electrical parts for the mobile and competitive robotics market, with a focus on robotics education. Formed in 2004, AndyMark, Inc. aims to support and grow robotics education and innovative designs for mobile robots. The AndyMark staff strives to support the FIRSTCommunity and the robotics education market by developing and distributing important components to robot builders.
AndyMark’s staff has over 200 years of FIRST team experience, and provides staffing services to many robot competition events throughout the year. Our Kokomo, Indiana home provides a central location for quick distribution across North America. We also have much experience shipping internationally to over 60 countries.
From 2007 to 2011, AndyMark was a tenant within the Inventrek technology park in Kokomo. We outgrew Inventrek in the fall of 2011 and moved in to a commercial building we now call home. Also, AndyMark was named “Business of the Year” for 2011 by the Kokomo Chamber of Commerce. Currently, AndyMark is one of the leading distributors and makers of robotics parts within the robotics mobility and competition market.
While CTR is Cross The Road Electronics was founded by Mike Copioli and Omar Zrien in 2006. Our goal is to provide robust embedded solutions for various robotic and control applications. We have successfully designed products on multiple processor architectures while incorporating various I/O capabilities and communication protocols including CAN bus, Ethernet, I2C, SPI, and USB (host and device). Our designs are unique, durable and cost effective and have been used by customers worldwide. Whether your needs involve software or hardware – our intent is to provide creative and durable solutions that meet the needs of our customer.
Best Regards,
Mike and Omar
Both were awesome to meet and hear what they have in store to make a brighter tomorrow for us all.
Now one man that had everyone wondering just what was that sound was Dr. Blankenstein.
Drew Blanke’s (aka Dr. Blankenstein) audio career started rather early in life, playing for various bands in the East Village and local NYC clubs and bars as a teen.
While this was developing, so was his love for computer / circuit engineering, as well as video production / graphic and web design. Being an early Commodore64 BASIC programmer, BBS owner, and circuit kit builder (HeathKits) certainly helped fuel these passions.
Later he would go to audio school for Audio Engineering / Jazz Composition. This was the gateway to a long career in electronic music performance / production and event promotion. He performed live around the country playing and promoting for 3 major NYC production companies.
This man was a trip to meet and his energy was very infectious to say the least, every kid and adult left his table with a huge smile on there face as did I.
I would like to thank The Henry Ford in Dearborn, Mich, and Make: magazine and Maker Media. For having this event and having us there to share in the joy that is Maker Faire Detroit.
Thank you for reading and links will be below for all I talked about in this post, and please keep doing it for the love of the game.