Monday, March 9, 2015

Taj's Tinkers and Tidbits




This is a Taj.

He is a multi-talented tinkerer who chooses to build from scratch, projects he finds challenging and fun.

He led a workshop for kids called Taj's Tinkers and Tidbits which inspired his projects presented at flagship Maker Faires 
in New York and Bay Area.

His work is evolving, and remains eclectic and inspiring to those who are still new to Maker culture.


He made this Companion Cube





















to become 
















He loves Portal so much he also built 
                                                          the Sentry Turret with his NXT



Taj's NXT Sentry Turret displays the Portal logo and plays Portal sound effects, detects motion, and replies when the sensor is activated with "There you are." and "Goodbye." when deactivated or when knocked over with "No hard feelings."

The project is the homemade version of 


On this NXT project his mentor was Baz
who he met at the Montreal Mini Maker Faire 2012


Taj helped shape this kid-friendly local event by working with his family in founding the first Montreal Mini Maker Faire.


On a visit to New York Maker Faire 2012, Taj was proud to win his first Arduino kit  during a Nerdy Derby round.




For the Notman House Family Hackathon, Taj presented his "Spectatron" (or wrist thingy) 
that consists of an Arduino, LCD, switches, dual-pot. joystick, PS2 keyboard connector, and, or course, an indicator LED that attach to his arm. 





Essentially, the main purpose of the Spectatron is to remind me what I need to be doing. It takes input from the keyboard, runs it through some code on the Arduino, saves it (to the Arduino), and displays it on the LCD. It can store up to 9 tasks, each consisting of 3 16-char lines. You can scroll through them with the joystick. One switch is to change between input and display modes, while the other is for power (that's where the LED comes in too, you guessed it). The keyboard, of course, can be unplugged and put away, for portability. 
Of course, why limit its usability to only one function? I've updated the software to include a stopwatch and a random dice roller/coin flipper, for those low-stakes but somehow difficult decisions.  



With another Arduino, Taj designed his own method of lighting up his room when he enters. 
He uses a laser pointer to trigger a solar panel that activates an Arduino that turns on the mechanical relay and thus the light bulb.



In September 2014, he presented these Arduino projects and his other work as Taj's Tinkers and Tidbits at the New York Maker Faire where crowds kept him busy with questions all weekend.




For the Maker Faire Bay Area 2015 
his demo of Taj's Tinkers and Tidbits included
his Cos Play adventure, as the Medic

Taj built the backpack 


and the Medi Gun to heal teammates, 
at Montreal's first makerspace: Helios


The lever activated 
the internal motor and LED lights to simulate the game play.

 Amongst Taj's homemade gear on display for these two flagship Maker Faires were his Dr Who's Sonic Screwdriver that can light up with sound effects.


As well the early stages of a game built in Python running on a Raspberry Pi where viewers can add their own inputs 
to see how the results fluctuate.


This simulation consists of 1) a central production site for 3 foods, 2) 3 cities which subtract their needs from the central food production, and 3) a storage site for surplus of each of the foods.  Each production and subtraction constitutes 1 round of the simulation.
At the start of the simulation each city is assigned a need for each food (a random number between presets). If the amount currently in storage minus the “needed” amount is more than 0, then the operation goes through and the program subtracts (and the program adds a reserve food). Then that repeats for each city for each food. If the result is equal to or less than 0, however, the program tries to make the result more than 0 (by trading). Then if the result is still less than or equal to 0, the program subtracts a reserve food.
The only real numbers that are retained between rounds are the foods in storage and the reserve foods of each city.  Everything else is a modifier of those variables. They vary between rounds, and are reset each round.
The amount produced is a random number between two presets that changes each round. The amount generated is added to that food’s storage.
In addition, random events (for example, a loss in production of a particular food) change various amounts like production rates and storage amounts.
When there is no more reserve food for a city, its “need” is always zero. When all reserve food is zero, the program ends.
 .......................................................................................................................................................