Scotiabank Nuit Blanche

So after a great deal of work on both my project partner Alex Heidbuechel and myself, we will be attending Scotiabank Nuit Blanche with an interesting video installation work. The work is based on conceptions of self as related to our interactions with others. It uses a fun game created by surrealists known as the exquisite corpse as an avenue to explain our idea, although we have remediated the game through use of media technologies such as video and projections. The event will be ephemeral and no lasting tangible work is created, however to use our own theory and to borrow from that of Marcel Duchamp the viewer creates our work through their interactions with it.

We owe much to the myriad of people who made this project possible.

First and foremost I would like to thank Scotiabank for sponsoring the even.
Sarah you have been instrumental in making this all happen, as well the city of Toronto has done much to help the independent projects and without that support who knows where many of us would be.
We would like to thank the Niagara Artist Company, and In the Soil for their continued support.
We would like to thank organizations such as the Ontario Arts Counsel, and the Trillium Foundation for their support of artist throughout ontario, and Carfac for artist across Canada.
Thank you to the Rotary Club for the use of your events tent.
Marinko Jareb of The Disco Gallery.
I would like to personally thank artist Duncan McDonald for his continued support.
Additionally, thank you Brock University and the Visual Arts department.
We would like to thank our friends and family for their support.

And to anyone who we have forgot to mention, you have not been forgotten. For without all of you this project would not have been possible.

We hope to see you out on October 2nd, 2010.

Synth32 - Update

I have been populating the second prototype run of synth32 prototype boards, although the work is going slower than I would hope. Many other projects need attention for upcoming art shows and I haven't been able to commit as much time as I want to this project. This project is very important to me and I hope to commit more time in the near future to getting this project making sound.

More information and board updates can be found on the electro-music forums here under the eChuck discussion.

OBD-II interface

As part of a larger project I have completed an ELM327 interface. The board is very simple and a rough image of the end product is posted bellow. The main project can be found here as part of the OBDuinoInterface or OpenGauge project.

PS3: Because sony doesn't listen

Because the sony blog will not let me post this I am posting it here for all who care:
Wow, I am infuriated.

The otherOS feature is the only reason I bought PS3 and not Xbox360. This feature was foremost a selling point for the system. And as such you misrepresented the product. By forcing this update you are retracting on a buyers agreement, and have hamstrung the product I originally purchased.

As Beathose states I too purchased a $699 PS3 console with otherOS functionality. Now I am getting the functionality of a $299 console. Patching for security reasons is a ridiculous excuse. There are only two possible solutions to correct this problem. #1 Sony refunds every customer the difference in value of the original systems to the new cheaper system. or #2 you can reinitialize the otherOS functionality.

I realize that option #1 would ruin your company but I am sick of being bullied by Sony Corporation.

I personally will be contacting a lawyer to discuss the matter further. When I purchased this unit it was specifically for the otherOS functionality, and the game console side of things was secondary to this. The classification of this unit being a computer system and not game console could be argued as this system lacks critical functionality as a computer system.

The fact remains Sony is one of many companies, which can get away with treating its customers like this. Aside from removal of the otherOS feature we also have to be aware that now devices like my PSP will have limited functionality, especially with remote play. Most of what I have purchased in the SonyStore will be inaccessible, as the unit no longer lets you login to your PSN account. So this unit no longer has internet connectivity for a number of things. This was not the unit I purchased, and this was not part of the agreement for the other content I purchased. Additionally, this unit would not classify as a computer system in anyone's mind without critical features like internet connectivity.

flowjo69, as you state the PS3 is a gaming console however, what you fail to realize is the unit was marketed in a variety of ways, including a full Linux compatible computer system. The classification of the product for import is also that of a computer system. So I am curious to know if you have the newer and cheaper slim unit, in which case your comment is a moot point as this issue would not have effected you anyway.

FoX_HounD_2ooX and SteelRush I agree, I have been with sony for a long time PS1, PS2, two premium Minidisc units (MD and HiMD) which they abandoned, a Sony field Recorder, Walkman, etc. Hundreds of games which I might add have all been purchased (not copied for PS1 and PS2) even though mod-chipping and coping was so prevalent. I have bought my fair share of products which are essentially all scrap now. For the first time I figured I would at least come out with a Linux machine after the console was long since dead and abandon.

So simply put this once great machine is now a hunk of junk.


Additionally, I am sure all the game developers are now elated that I can no longer purchase additional add-ons and content for the existing games I own, because I need the CellBE programming functionality and the linux os in general in my PS3.


Amendment @ 1:31 AM April 7, 2010.

The other matter which is further complicating the issue is they delete any post from the blog that is too long, or is unfavorable for their image. In effect censoring the issue and as a result downplaying the dissatisfaction of many.

Pants off to the 303- x0xb0x

Today I finally finished the x0xb0x #1. It has been over a year since I finished the build but for some reason I just did not order a case. Well finally the x0xb0x adorns its pactec PT-10 case and it looks beautiful. Aside from missing two knobs, I just could not find the right ones.

Synth32 - Update

As some may know the initial Synth32 boards arrived a few weeks ago, and I have been populating the boards. In the fashion of a true prototype there are some errors which the version 2 board will not have, additionally there are some things I deliberately omitted which will be included such as a 5th order low-pass filter, and on board power supply which includes +5, +3.3, and -5 volts for better amplification.



The revision 2 board is in every respect better than the first. A great number of ideas have been explored and the board is much tighter with a better layout, and access to every pin will now be a reality with very large pads. I think everyone will be pleased.

The second order of proto-boards will happen in the next few weeks after routing of the new board is completed. Please be patient as I want to eliminate all bugs before I do a larger order for these boards.

Loose Ends - Bench Top Powersupply from an ATX computer power supply.

Today I decided to finish a project which has been sitting in a bin for about 6 months.

The project was found here at Incructables.com

It is a fantastic project, and with the supply used I now have +5v, -5v, +3.3v, +12v and -12v. The total price to finish this modification was around $30 CAD. Most of the cost was for the banana plugs.

The project is really easy and requires only a 10 ohm 10watt resistor, 2 220 ohm resistors, two LED's, and banana plugs. I am looking forward to not having to make a breadboard power supply for each project.

An additional link: Here

Easy LCD screen interface on Atmega32 using Peter Fleury's LCD Driver

How easy is it to connect an LCD screen to an Atmega32? Well very easy.

Peter Fleury's HD44780 compatible LCD library works quite well with only one modification to the code; you must edit the clock frequency in the test_lcd.c file to your desired target, mine was 16000000 for 16mHz.

Talk about easy!!!

In this example I use PORT A which is commonly used as an 10-bit analog to digital converter. Seeing as I have no use for A-to-D on this project PORT A seems like the logical choice. In this project the port is running as standard digital I/O for screen display using 4-bits. PORTA,0-4 are the 4-bit data lines and PORTA,5-7 are the Reg. Select, Read/Write, and Enable pins. The test_lcd.c file requires no editing and the lcd.h file only requires the change of


"#define XTAL 4000000"

to

"#define XTAL 16000000"

to the desired clock speed of the target MCU. The size of the test_lcd.hex file loaded to the atmega32 was 3kb, which is quite small and leaves 29kb of free Flash space for your program code. If one so desired much of the driver is written in C which could be optimized in assembler to decrease the size of the code base. I however am willing to let 3kb go.

Compilation of the test_lcd.c was done with AVR-GCC 4.4.2 on Mac OS 10.6, then loaded with AVR Studio 4.18 on Windows XP using an AVR ISP MkII.

Power Supply board 9v, 5v, 3v

This board has been in my library for a while just waiting for the right time to make an appearance. It works although the version 1 looked like New York City. I needed to fix some serious errors. All is good now and I am ready to get this one going. You will notice the FTC "resistor fuse" this is optional as it will limit the amperage.

Pickit 2 3.3v Voltage converter

I found a schematic online for a 3.3v logic converter for the Pickit 2, and decided to make a board for it. The key was making it very small. I wanted something I could just fit in my pocket with thePickit 2 programmer. The design has to be tested but the schematic looked sound. If you want a copy of the board in PDF to make your own just send me a message, its going to take me a little while to put the files on the server.


update: Jan 10, 2010

Aduino

So I made an arduino board! Well not quite, its a little different more like the barebones arduino idea with surface mount parts. I wanted something small with a tiny power regulator for 5v logic only, which suited my needs better than some of the other boards available. Regardless the files are available if you want them.

update Jan 10, 2010

Bonome

So I was going through some old posts and decided to see what Julien Bayle of Julienbayle.net is doing and was looking at the monome clone called the Bonome. This project really excited me it was a meeting of the minds with so many different people, hardware, software, firmware, and of course we can not forget the creators the original monome team.

Now with my new project I have decided to switch to PIC32. Why because I want to learn another platform and there are a few other reasons such as the support for DSP with there new library. Less coding means more fun for me.



This board is something new a PIC32 development system designed for audio. I have some interesting needs for art installation ideas however, the realization of the works have been halted due in part to the extreme cost of audio synthesizers. Of course there is a large amount of intellectual property under the hood of a synth, but developing your own can be rewarding, and teaches you much about synthesis techniques. There is a forum post started here on Electro-Music. Inventor has designed a system called eChuck based on the Chuck programming language; essentially it is an audio programming language. The eChuck concept will allow people to port that idea onto hardware.

I expect to be in prototype soon, I just need to hear back from a board house on the cost of manufacture of a few prototypes. In the mean time a programming application framework is being developed to meat my needs, and additionally board for tactile input and visual output are in the works. Which brings me back the the bonome, I have designed the unit with a header to connect to the 8x8 keypad / led matrix. If I can port the code over I will but it is more likely that I will write the interface to suit my own uses internally for sequencing. But its a way to reuse some older equipment if you have it.

Stay tuned for additional info on the project either here or on the Electro-music forum.