Traveling through San Jose Airport on New Years, I saw this piece. A beautiful piece on the omnipresence of observation, measurement, and quantification. Surprisingly poignant piece to see in the context of an airport’s collection. (And right outside of security.)

Breathing is the process that moves air in and out of the lungs. Aerobic organisms require oxygen to release energy via respiration, in the form of the metabolism of energy-rich molecules such as glucose. Breathing is only one process that delivers oxygen to where it is needed in the body and removes carbon dioxide. Another important process involves the movement of blood by the circulatory system. Gas exchange occurs in the pulmonary alveoli by passive diffusion of gases between the alveolar gas and the blood in lung capillaries. Once these dissolved gases are in the blood, the heart powers their flow around the body (via the circulatory system). The medical term for normal relaxed breathing is eupnea.
In addition to removing carbon dioxide, breathing results in loss of water from the body. Exhaled air has a relative humidity of 100% because of water diffusing across the moist surface of breathing passages and alveoli.

Wikipedia: Breathing

One thing I’ve been researching lately has been muscle wire. It’s pretty cool stuff. You heat it / put the right amount of current through it, and it contracts. Cool it / turn it off, it expands back to its original length. And all while totally silent. Neat.

Most of them seem to only contract between 5 and 7 percent. That’s fine, but requires you do something to do something mechanical to make larger movements.

The stuff in the video above however, Biometal helix (BMX), contracts about 50%. It’s weaker, but for a lot of things, it’s still just fine.

Now if I can just find some of the stuff….

Coming right off of writing a post about setting “reasonable” goals, here’s a post about the beauty of setting completely crazy ones.

My friend / acquaintance / dude who once gave me a virtual high five – Ryan Estrada just past his deadline on a completely obsurd goal: The One Month Animated Feature

It’s always been my dream to make an animated feature, but I’ve never been able to get the time and resources I need. Well, I’m sick of waiting. This December, I’m sitting down at my desk in the Costa Rican jungle to work. And on January 1st, I’m releasing the finished movie online, free to all.

Something I’ve always admired about Ryan is that he makes a habit out of setting crazy unobtainable goals. And more impressive? He usually accomplishes them.

Usually. This time he came up short.

Well ladies and gentlemen, I didn’t make the deadline. But you know what I did make? About 90% of a pretty awesome movie. I’ll have it to you just as quick as I can!

There are still a handful of scenes to composite, but there’s no way we can get them done, uploaded, downloaded, edited, rendered and posted in time.

You know what? I’m still impressed. Ryan’s been posting previews and stills all the while, and it looks great. Not just “it looks great for a one month’s effort.” It just looks great.

So while we (you and me) wait patiently for the finishing touches to be put on this film, lets watch this sneak peak Ryan posted. Lets watch it, savor it, and try to think what we’ve accomplished in the last month. Because, while I can’t speak for you, I sure as hell didn’t make a movie last month.

Well, it’s a new year, and thus, time for some resolutions.

2010 was a great year, I primarily focused on my professional life, and was rewarded with the opportunity to work on a lot of really cool projects at Quango. I’m really proud of the work I’ve been doing here, and I’m looking forward to the next year.

What I didn’t do, and I’m a bit ashamed of this, is complete a single piece of art. I started several pieces, did a lot of research and made a sweet little mechanical puppet of myself drinking a beer while riding a unicorn but no finished art. And on top of that, the research I did do, really isn’t well documented or organized.

Which brings us to my 2 resolutions for the new year. I don’t make a habit of making these, but some times it’s good to reflect and set some goals.

Resolution #1 – Create at least one finished art piece.

I want to be really ambitious and say “Create at least one finished art piece per month,” but I know my process and no that it won’t happen. And I know that the first failed deadline will just make the next deadline seem all the more insurmountable, which will bring me right back to this point next year, so I’m leaving it at “Create at least one finished art piece.”

BUT I am throwing in this caveat: When that one is finished, get onto the next one. Never stop producing.

Resolution #2 – Use this blog.

Over the next year I will use this blog to document all of my research, all of my progress, all of my successes and most importantly, all of my failures. Building things requires experimentation, and most experiments turn out unexpectedly. Learning to accept, document and learn from these failures is key if I’m going to succeed at resolution 1.

So that’s it. Simple, obtainable, and slightly vague goals.

2011 – Lets do this!

(Actually written on January 4, 2011 at 10:19 am, but I’m post-dating this as a January 1^st entry for later reference.)

Just a quick little mechanical puppet of me riding a unicorn while drinking a beer.

Yes, the beer is in a pint glass. Because damn it, I’m classy!

Breaking my unintentional blogging hiatus to share this video with you.

Smell like a Monster.

So I’ve been thinking through a piece I’m working on. (How’s that for vague!)

Part of it involves developing a basic walking toy, which seems pretty simple conceptually. But I wanted to verify that the way I was thinking it through would work mechanically. So I took apart my Punisher windup toy.

… now to put it back together.

or gearLinks …I can’t decide which name I prefer.

Talking to my mom she told me about how my dad couldn’t keep his hands off the gEarings I made her for mother’s day, and how everytime they went out, he wanted her to wear them so he could show them off to people.

So for Christmas (yes, I’m way behind on uploading this thing) I modified the design to make them a pair of cufflink gears. This involved making everything larger, widening the track for the posts, and closing the hole in the center that was used to store the earrings backings.

I liked these so much that I made a second set for myself.

As usual, I’ve uploaded the design files and instructions to Thingiverse for your enjoyment.

[Update: FEATURED]