Free Universal Construction Kit

It has arrived.  I can truly die happy.

The Free Universal Construction Kit promises to make all construction toys compatible through their FREE ready-to-print adapters.  That means Lego, K'nex, Tinkertoys, and many many more of our childhood favourites can live together in harmony.

http://fffff.at/free-universal-construction-kit/

The Free Universal Construction Kit from Adapterz on Vimeo.
Thank you F.A.T. Lab and Sy-Lab gods.

Australian Update

Sorry I’ve been kind of neglecting you guys since I’ve been here. Moving to a new country takes a lot of work (setting up banking, cell phones, internet connections, etc. etc...boring stuff).

I’ve been in Adelaide, Australia for a little over a month now and am in my 4th week of school at the University of South Australia (UniSA). I’ve enrolled myself in 3rd year studio: focus on usability design, ceramic production techniques, and furniture for manufacture. 

First off, our studio actually has windows! I was really excited about that. The atriums on our campus are also all outside, since they don’t really have to deal with the same weather conditions that we do. It’s really cool, but also very strange.

Oh, hi Justin!

Studio:

• Worth double credit (like 1st semester 3rd year at Carleton)
• 2 projects in parallel:
• redesign a mobile projection unit (a cart with a projector, a laptop, and all the fixings)
• redesign a stud finder (focus on model building for iterations. Foam and simple electronics.)

Thanks to the stud finder project, I’ve learned to solder in the last 2 days. Built myself a snazzy circuit board too so I can test the feedback and usability of my models. 

The lights and speaker can all be inserted into foam models so I can use the
control board to replicate actual functions during user testing.

Ceramic Production Techniques:

• Basically a mix of techniques (like from mass pro) and an arts course
• I play with clay and mix up glazes

Furniture for Manufacture:

• Pretty much what the title says
• First project was a research project on a designer and one of their designs. We did our video on Hans Wegner’s Papa Bear Chair.
• Final project will be to design and fabricate a full scale stool.

So that’s a little update on ID life in Adelaide. If you’re interested in reading a bit about what else has been going on down here outside of school feel free to visit my travel blog, because Australia is freaking awesome.

-Linette

Third Year Birdhouse Review

After a few weeks or hard work, the third year ID students presented their finished birdhouse projects. Most students created full scale models, with a select few creating scale models. Students were divided into research groups centered around a local canadian bird and then came up with individual solutions to the design opportunities they found. 

Rylan presenting his Purple Martin Community birdhouse. 

Iris Wang's Children's Birdhouse (left) and Paul Chamandy-Cook's Refuge Birdhouse (right), designed to accomodate the needs of both blue birds and chickadees. 

Call For Entries Design Competition

SWITZERCULTCREATIVE.COM

MODERN LUXURY; SUSTAINABLE FURNITURE DESIGN

FIRST ANNUAL DESIGN COMPETITION

Call for Entries – Registration is Open

ENTRIES WILL BE ACCEPTED UNTIL SEPTEMBER 1, 2012

Winner will be announced November 30, 2012

1. Submit your entry on the Official Entry Form provided.

2. Attach a description of your entry using a maximum of 200 words.

3. Each person may submit up to 3 individual entries. Each entry must be accompanied by a completed entry form.

4. Each submission must be accompanied by up to 6 image files of your project. Please note: use only low resolution jpeg images (72 dpi) maximum 150 kb each file, image size maximum is 818 pixels.

For further information LIKE our Facebook page www.facebook.com/SwitzerCultCreative and request an entry form by sending an email to:

renee@switzercultcreative.com

www.switzercultcreative.com