Chicago-based painter and art educator Lorraine Peltz sums it up for most artists when she compares being an artist to breathing.
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Using a laser like a saw to cut thicker material.
Peter from the RepRap Builders blog has come up with a clever way to cut thicker material with a weaker laser. His experimental laser cutter moves the focus of the laser up and down in a saw-like motion.
In a typical laser cutter the laser moves on a flat plane. It can move side to side in any direction, but it does not move up and down. But why would it need to since laser cutters cut flat sheets of material? What you may not know is that the laser is cone-shaped, not straight and cylindrical. This means that there is a particular point, the focal distance, where the laser is the most powerful. Read the How does laser-cutting work? FAQ for more details.
Typical laser cutters use a 20-100 Watt laser, which is powerful enough to cut even when material is not exactly at the focal point. Peter’s laser uses a 1 Watt laser that can cut 1mm thick plastic, albeit slowly, by moving the most powerful part of the laser up and down through the thickness of the material.
This idea could help make cheap, widely available laser cutters a reality in the same way as projects like RepRap and Makerbot have dramatically reduced the cost of basic 3D printers. Read our pricing guide of inexpensive 3D printers for more information. Remember that three of them are available through Ponoko.
Via Buildlog.net
editors: texts by nicolas bourriaud, bruce grenville, hou hanru, vivan rehberg,
annette tietenberg, graphic design by gabriele sabolewski
publisher: hatje cantz
language: english
year: 2010
size: 200 pages, 22.50 x 28.60 cm
isbn: 978-3-7757-2429-6
designboom rating: 
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contemporary artist michael lin is known for producing ambitious installations that
reconfigure public spaces and pre-existing architectural structures.
content
born in japan, but raised in taiwan, michael lin's mural sized paintings depict floral patterns
and designs which have been derived from traditional taiwanese textiles. his site-specific works
take over the spaces in which they are executed, creating a non-traditional encounter
between art and audience.
this publication is the first comprehensive overview of michael lin's practice. it includes,
texts by curators and writers who have collaborated previously with lin, including
nicolas bourriaud (gulbenkian curator for contemporary art at tate britain),
bruce grenville (senior curator at the vancouver art gallery), hou hanru (director of exhibitions
and public programs, and chair of exhibition and museum studies at the san francisco art institute).
is it for me?
the book provides a nice overview of lin's contemporary art practice. it provides colorful
illustrations of key projects, and how each individual hand-painted mural, though similar in imagery,
presents differently in each of the diverse architectural and public spaces in which they are presented.
'honolulu', 2005
'georgia street plaza, 23.01 - 02.05.10', 2010, installation at the vancouver art gallery
'atrium stadhuis den haag, 12.07 - 08.09.2002', 2002, installation at atrium stadhuis, the hague
left: beijing, 2006
right: 'windscape', 2006 installation at tang contemporary art center, beijing
......................... interesting ................... good read, worth a look ............. very good ....... excellent, recommended . must have
project info:
center for hearing and language, zurich-wollishofen
client: canton of zurich, building department
canton of zurich, education authority
center for hearing and language, zurich
program: 8 class rooms (2 of which useable as kindergarten) max. 5-6 pupils / 4 adjoining rooms
for individualized teaching (e.g. speech therapy) / 1 physiotherapy, occupational therapy room
(divisible) / 1 storage room
foot print: 382m2
gross floor area: 1055 m2
gross volume: 4347 m3
designer's own words:
'exploring what happens when we sit on something soft, and how it changes slightly with our body,
led me to take the change that happens in cushioned upholstery.(...) I wanted to create a different
and surprising object when one sits on it. the pieces I developed were influenced by my inability
to see an empty chair in a room – chairs that were lacking because no one is sitting in them.
all this led me to create an object that looks whole within the space even when no one is sitting on it.'
Filling A Small Part Of The World With Colour
On display at the bridgegallery in Manhattan’s Lower East Side is this colourful laser-cut spectacle conceived and constructed by Softlab. Uniquely shaped panels form a meandering series of tunnels, and it is all held together by everyday bulldog clips.
Not only uniquely shaped; each panel is also printed with its own subtle hue, and the resulting gradation of tone through the tunnels gives this project its name: Chromatex.me
For a month we will fill a small part of the world with one of our favorite things: COLOR!
This installation was able to be produced thanks to a donation program through kickstarter. According to how much people donated to the project, they would have their names or a message laser-etched onto the back of one of the 4,600+ unique panels. Once the exhibition is over, the personalised keepsake will be shipped to the donor’s home.
You can read all about this process as well as see a few pictures of the panels being produced and assembled at an earlier article on Designboom.
All images courtesy of Softlab. Photos by Andrew Manart.
It certainly is quite a mammoth undertaking… but if you head to the Softlab website and have a look at some of their other stuff (there’s a whole lot more laser cutting) it is clear that these guys are no strangers to handling fiddly details. Personally, I’d like to see what would happen if the Softlab team and MWM were locked in the same room for a while. Talk about colourful spectacles!
If you’re in New York, you can see the Chromatex.me installation for yourself at bridgegallery – it will be on display for a month from August 26.
Thanks to Designboom via Makedo
prairie forest view
engaging the river and eastbank
the bluff's view
site plan
the PWP, foster, civitas team also brings the sustainable-site-systems and structural
engineering prowess of buro happold, the graphic artistry of 2×4, inc., the venue
programming intelligence of lord cultural resources, and the public-art experience
of ned kahn studios, along with the skills of many other talented experts. in st. louis,
the team includes mackey mitchell architects, cole & associates civil engineers, vector
communications, washington university professor dorothée imbert, cbb transportation
engineers, m3 engineering group, and code consultants, inc.
'a country gentlemen once bought 10000 crayfishes in the 90Â’s to plant in a stream running through his land.
in the autumn he would capture about a hundred of them to eat at the annual swedish crayfish parties.
the crayfishes however slowly started to emigrate to another nearby lake outside the patronÂ’s estate.
desperate of seeing his neighbors feast on his crayfishes, he contacted visiondivision to solve his problem.
visiondivision decided to help the patron by building him a refugee where the crayfishes could immigrate back.
by investigating the condition of the stream we soon found out that it was the lack of stones, hiding places
and the lack of calcite that probably had made the crayfishes emigrate. the city planning would focus on
solving these issues.(...)' - visiondivision
'cancer city' site and surrounding area with crayfish emigration pattern
Back in March, we wrote about Israeli designer Itay Laniado's wooden ladder, walking stick and wallet. Expanding on his explorations in wood and simple mechanisms, he recently completed an investigative study on the material, aesthetic and functional properties of what he calls garden tools (but which seem to us to be more historically-minded farm tools). The result is a group of six oak and stainless steel tools, all with the pop of red twine-wrapped handles.
For the six tools (machete, sickle, spade, shovel, scythe and bow saw), Laniado developed a technique of bending and stretching the oak into what he found to be the most appropriate functional and simple form for each object. He also experimented with methods for bending and shaping the steel blades, along with their forms. His aesthetic is serious but subtle, with a nice contrast between the get-down-to-business blades and the approachability of the wood handles and red twine. You've gotta have quite the garden (and maybe some pent-up aggression...or just a farm and some Amish pep) to warrant some of these.
Reading a business text explain that while the Indian economy is growing rapidly, the vast bulk of the populace still engages in subsistence work might dryly get the idea across. To really understand an economy, however, prospective students would be well served to look at both macro and microeconomic issues. That's why clicking the multimedia links in the first case of the Yale School of Management's Design and Social Enterprises Series provides a more modern approach to the case study method of learning. Hearing SELCO's Thomas Pullenkav explain that, "For about 90 percent of SELCO's individual clients, the solar system they purchase is the most expensive system in their household, and will probably be the most costly item they have ever owned in their entire lives," contextualizes household spending power in a way that a per capita income figure in Rupees never could.
Historically, the case method of studying business was pioneered at Harvard Business School. Early teachers found that there were no business textbooks, so they examined existing businesses and their problems by interviewing executives. Out of that primary research, they built case studies as historical narratives describing the business's past and then asking a series of questions about what it should do in its operations to better prepare for the future. Nowadays, Harvard's cases include exhibits and multimedia links, but remain focused on business and management issues. We at Core77 (perhaps because industrial design is a multidisciplinary craft) tend to see things more holistically. For a teacher or student in a design field then, Yale's Design and Social Enterprises Series will be a very welcome tool, and an intriguing step forward in how the intertwining strands of business and design can be articulated and shared. In partnership with Design Observer and with funding from Rockefeller Foundation, the first case, on Indian solar lighting company SELCO is now available under a Creative Commons license for free noncommercial use. (More backstory from Design Observer can be found here and here.)
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Or how to avoid “smudgy yucky“
Burn marks are an inherent part of the laser cutting process – we are cutting things with a highly focused beam of fire after all. There are some tricks to minimizing this issue for different materials, and this post deals with acrylic.
Most of the acrylic sheets we use come with protective paper on both sides. It’s possible for us to leave this paper on when making your design, which we tend to do where it will not interfere with your engraving. The main downside to this is needing to peel paper off both sides of the acrylic, which can be time consuming and tricky if your design is intricate.
Generally our rule is: cut with paper on both sides if there is no raster engraving in the design, or if all raster engraving is of the heavy variety. Heavy raster engraving burns through the paper without any trouble, as does heavy and medium vector engraving. If the file has medium or light raster engraving, however, we will remove the protective paper from the top of the material unless otherwise requested.
It is possible to use medium engraving through the paper, but due to the dot matrix nature of the raster engraving not all the paper is burned away. A slightly sticky residue may be left on the plastic if you ask for this option – which may need to be cleaned off before you use it.
Below are some typical examples of what you get when laser cutting acrylic. It should be noted that it is most obvious on black hence using it as the example material. Also the images have been zoomed in to great detail and emphasizes the effects more than might be obvious to the naked eye.
Cutting – Paper Left On vs Paper Removed
On the left through the paper and on the right without paper. The right shows a clear example of the smudgy burn marks that are left on the acrylic after cutting. Clearly the shapes cut through the paper is cleaner than not.
Heavy Raster Engraving – Paper Left On vs Paper Removed
On the left through the paper and on the right without paper. You can see that engraving through the paper produces a crisper result. The vaporized acrylic builds up around the outside of the letters when the paper is not use and produces this slightly ‘inflated’ look. This would probably polish off should you have the desire to do so.
Medium Raster Engraving – Paper Left On vs Paper Removed
On the left through the paper and on the right without paper. Again engraving through the paper is a little crisper in the letter forms, but as mentioned earlier there may be sticky residue left over from the adhesive of the paper.
So what does all this mean?
If you want us to leave the paper on, you should only use heavy raster engraving. If you use medium or light raster engraving, we will make your design with the paper removed.
If you would like to specify how you want your job cut, make a note in the Special Shipping instructions.
Other tips for engraving & cleaning acrylic:
How to improve your engraving results – Part 1
How to improve your engraving results – Part 2
Tips for cleaning acrylic
Kudos to @deleifd and @skruff for the awesome type design.
Simple Idea: Time Saving Clock.
This year at the London Design Festival, the Korean Design Pavilion will continue to showcase a selection of Korea's top designers. They have selected designers based on the platform "Innovative Design through Advanced Technology," focusing on how new materials, new techniques and an experimental mindset can "introduce a whole new way of coexistence between the people and the environment."
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Check out these cell-phone-camera shots of airplane propellors, victim to an effect known as "rolling shutter."
What gives? As Flickr user Jason Mullins explains,
[I shot this with] an iPhone 4, and the scanning typically goes from top left to bottom right so moving objects lean to the left. Essentially any electronic shutter camera (i.e. not an SLR like mechanical shutter) will give these effects. Wikipedia has some good articles here: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rolling_shutter
For those who want to try this out, just point your simple electronic shutter camera at an object moving parallel to you, preferably fast, and take the photo. The faster the relative speed between you, the more the distortion. Rotating objects go really weird!
Hit the jump to see more examples, this time shot by Soren Ragsdale.
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There were cries of protest from purists when the technology was developed to colorize old black-and-white movies; one of the companies doing it generated plenty of bad press for colorizing an old Sinatra flick--and rendering his eyes brown. (Does the nickname "Ol' Blue Eyes" mean anything?)
We wonder if there will be similar outcry now that technology has been developed that can colorize ancient Greek and Roman statues. The difference here is that the colors are not being arbitrarily added--a combination of ultraviolet, infrared and X-ray spectroscopy can apparently divine the approximate hues these statues were painted in. And folks, it ain't always pretty:
Good gosh, Caesar Augustus' breastplate looks like a freaking five-year-old's birthday cake! And who knew the guy was ginger. io9's got the full story here.
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