June 11, 2020

Soldering and Keyboards

After Electronics I ordered soldering gear, and a couple of little kits. I made up the less useful one first (a “decision maker”) to learn on. All seemed good, worked the first time I tried it, then failed the next. Oddly it all lights up when button pressed, but doesn’t carry on like it should. I suspect capacitor failure, but not sure how to verify that.

The second is a light sensitive night-light. This went better, and neater soldering by me. Worked first time and continues to work. I bought a multimeter in between, which let me test things as I went for peace of mind.

That leads me to keyboards. I thought I’d start simple, with a Gherkin, without LEDs. 30% should be an interesting thing to learn, I’ve thought about other layouts (like colemak too, but we’ll see. I ordered the kit, which arrived pretty quickly. So far I’ve done the easiest bit, soldering on the diodes.

I’ve quite enjoyed the blend of physical and mental required for these projects. It has been nice to concentrate on the process, almost meditation. We’ll see how the rest goes, but I can see more projects of this sort happening.

electronics

June 5, 2020

Electronics

Following on from Mini Computers my AliExpress parts arrived and I’ve spent some time assembling the shutter tester in How to build a simple Arduino shutter tester.

The actual assembly went well, and I got it working easily enough. The tricky part was lining the laser and sensor up to measure the shutter speeds. I think I need a better way to do this than taping one to a monitor and one to a wall. I did however managed to record speeds for one large format lens (on the Mercury). But I’ll need to rig something up better before doing more.

This has led me to think about other projects in the small electronics vein. There’s quite a lot around now, especially educational packs. While aimed at kids, they do at least have some fun looking projects in them. There’s quite a few options in controller and what to do. From general kits, to robots. I’ll be digging around and seeing hat seems like a good starting eco-system, and then seeing about ordering some things in that.

I’ve also been looking at soldering, not something I’ve done much of. I think a soldering kit and some testing/learning sets might be a worthwhile investment.

The soldering is partly because I’m tempted by a mechanical keyboard build, most of which need soldering. Firstly as an electronics projects and secondarily as a way to try a small form keyboard (I’d be thinking a 40%, or even a 30% keyboard). Possibly this could be ortholinear, or even a split keyboard. I’ll not aim for all these in the first instance, but something in a simpler vein.

I think the initial plan for this is a soldering iron and associated bits and a small kit or two to have a go on. Once I think I can manage a keyboard I can think about ordering one. It also gives time for stock to come in (most places are low at the moment) and research into different options, probably some more to come on that.

electronics

May 29, 2020

A lack of photography

I thought I’d confess. I’ve not been making many photos. I had plans. I ordered boxes of Harmon direct positive and FP4, thinking something different would spur me on.

Alas, so far the wherewithal to take large format at home has not happened. I still intend to use the camera more, and in the current situation it’ll be at home. I think I need to expand my thoughts on imagery to the small scale, and the oddities in still life. Plus I could do some portraiture — likely self-portraiture. In that case I could setup to immediately develop, the direct positive a paper especially. It’ll make the end-to-end near-instant, which might act as a positive reinforcement to do more.

In the same vein I thought I might rectify the lack of photography with more Instax photography, about all I have been doing. However I ordered the wrong size (mini not wide) I can either try to return or hold onto it. I’d thought about getting an Instax mini camera before, and may do eventually.

The last thing is the other film I ordered, Ektachrome in 120. I’ll dig out the ETRS and use it in that. One advantage is I’ll be sending it off for development, and perhaps even scanning. I’m really looking forward to seeing large positives on the light table.

So as you can see I’m in a photography doldrums. I’ve some thoughts about getting out of it, so will make some plans to do one of them, and stick to them!

photography

May 22, 2020

Computer Gaming

Computer games have always been a part of my life, starting with a Windows 3.1 box and educational games, then Sega Mega Drive and PlayStation, and I even built a gaming PC in my teens. That was mainly used to play Tribes 2 — siege games generally — although the usual raft of other games snuck in. That was the high point of time spent computer gaming for me. Nothing really captured me like that game mode, and no one has replicated it (that I’m aware of).

Since they I’ve gone through phases of it, playing a bit of Team Fortress 2, a bit of Tribes: Ascend on my laptop (which just about managed to run it). Then a handful of mobile games on and off.

Recently that’s been Vainglory (after a bit of a gap, hadn’t played since before they made 5v5) and Armajet. The latter is definitely taking my interest more (Vainglory’s recent community version changes make it a little weird to play). To the point that I recently bought a controller, as the touch interface was annoying me too much.

Harking back to mini computers I’ve also contemplated a RetroPie and reliving my youthful game playing options. Similarly people are still keeping Tribes 2 going in Tribes Next, might be worth looking for a siege server in that, if I can get it running. Lastly I’ve considered buying a new console, but not sure that’s something I want to do right now. I’ll take a look at the available games on each for a start. With more time at home there’s more time for one or more of these options, assuming is want to fit it in amongst other possibilities.

computer gaming

May 9, 2020

Piano update

Date: 2020-05-15 11:00 Tags: Piano Title: Piano Update Permalink: piano-update

Piano Update

I’ve been playing piano for about 7 weeks so far. I’m on lesson 9 of Bill Hilton’s Piano For Beginners. That’s about one a week, which I think is the designed pace. I’ve also been doing the odd bit of improvisation, again based on some Bill Hilton videos.

The main thing that’s still a struggle is bass clef reading. Years of reading just treble mean I have to think a little every time. Getting better with doing it though, just not as natural yet. Otherwise the expected coordination fun, especially when getting to different rhythms in each hand. The main thing is the slow improvement over time, and that I’m enjoying it.

Currently I’ve settled into 20–30 minutes morning practice, which feels like a maintainable amount. More might be something to work to, but less and ensuring it happens daily seems more important for now.

I’m intending to continue with the above series, given there’s 20 or so, I’ll only have to think about what next in a few months. By then I should have more of an idea about what the next step could and should be.

May 8, 2020

Mini Computers

I’ve recently been looking into a couple of forms of mini computer, for a few purposes. Partly a little bit of computing fun at home, partly for “serious” purposes.

Arduino

The first thing I ordered parts for was from the article How to build a simple Arduino shutter tester. I’ve been thinking of buying parts for some form of shutter tester for a while, and this one seemed better than the sound based versions that are normally around. A small amount on AliExpress later and I’ll have some parts, eventually (as Ethan says, it’ll be a holiday when they arrive).

That’s a bit of programming, a bit of electronics and hopefully I’ll have a useful object, and some fun. Watch this space.

Raspberry Pi

The second one I’m looking at is Raspberry Pis, the almost ubiquitous mini computer I’ve never owned. I’ve been delving into uses, and there are lots, so here’s a few I’m seriously considering.

Pi-Hole

Pi-Hole is an ad-blocker that uses a DNS sink to eliminate ads. It’s rather nifty, removing them on a network wide level. Not too hard to install, and not needing too much to run, I’ve eBayed a second hand RP 2 for this. It may turn into more than just that, if I find some other server/network things to use it for.

Keybow

The Pimoroni Keybow is a mini customisable keyboard. Not sure I’ve got huge uses for it, but it’s a tempting project, there’s a whole set of tutorials on building, then simple and advanced programming. Out of stock at the moment, but we’ll see if/when it comes back in.

Cluster

I stumbled on Five years of Raspberry Pi clusters when looking into the above. There’s a load of good articles linked to in there, and it’s somewhat inspiring. Bit of a mad idea, but might be a fun (and relatively cheap) way to play around with clustering.

That also leads to the author’s other/main project OpenFaaS. I’ve dealt a little with serverless in work, but interesting to see a non-vendor specific version I could potentially try out at home.

It also led me to Cluster HAT. A more traditional cluster in the supercomputer vein. Different purposes but also intriguing. Likely cheaper too, but there seems to be some difficulty getting hold of the required components. That said I think I can see less use for this than a Kubernetes cluster.

Cheap Computer

It wouldn’t be powerful, but the RPi 4 one would be a cheap computer. With the right screen etc. it could even be portable. Someone’s even tried it here. I don’t really need one, but it is intriguing.

Various other kits/ideas

I’ll not list them all, there’s a lot around. From retro console emulators, to home automation, as well as various smaller projects. Many temptations, but not sure yet.

Conclusion

I’ll stick to the couple of initial ideas I’ve got planned (shutter tester and Pi-Hole). The others will wait, I’ll see how I get on with each, and see if they spark any ideas. There’s probably a few Arduino projects that might be interesting. I may have a play with OpenFaaS on a laptop in the meantime.

arduino raspberry pi computing tech