PixelBrite: Programmable Pixel Light Panels

PixelBrite by LeoneLabs

I’m getting used to being in total awe of some of the creativity, innovation, and pure genius displayed by people all over the Internet. The Geek collective especially seems to be amply blessed in all three departments, and this Instructable inspired by the wonderful Close Encounters of the Third Kind, posted by LeoneLabs, is no exception.

Admittedly, this isn’t your easy-to-recreate kind of geekcraft. You’ll need to get your head around electronics, microcontrollers, a bit of code, and it looks like you’d need a fair bit of patience to do all of the optimising and stuff that LeoneLabs goes into in the later steps. The components and materials also cost in the region of $550, but when you look at the results (and there are more awesome images to drool over if you follow the link), it looks like $550 well spent!

Personally, I have nothing further than GCSE (10th grade) electronics knowledge, and probably even less experience wth microcontrollers. So I will just sit back and marvel at the greatness that is PixelBrite, and wish I had one. Or four.

How-to: Hogwarts Houses Cake

Hogwarts Cake

Darla at Bakingdom.com clearly put a fair bit of work into the delicious looking Harry Potter cake, but the result looks spectacular. It’s a cake that caters for each house of Hogwarts: Gryffindor, Ravenclaw, Hufflepuff and Slytherin, at least in colours if not in volume! Darla has written out full instructions in the post – including recipes for the Spice Cake and Cream Cheese Frosting – should you want to give this a go. So check it out, along with some other of her great Hogwarts themed goodies here: Hogwarts, Hogwarts, Hoggy Warty Hogwarts Cake.

Now all we need is a spell for removing cakey goodness from one’s hips! Skinnyramus!

Half-Life Headcrab Cushion

Half-Life Headcrab Cushion

Have you seen Half-Life this headcrab cushion? I want one. Even if it is just so I can wear it on my head occasionally and flail my arms around the living room.

This amazing creation was posted on the Craftster.org forum by user luchadork138. Take a look at her post as there are more great photos of it, though this is the only one of the dog I’m afraid. Man, that’s one brave puppy.

Awesome Minecraft Illustration

Minecraft Birthday

Check out this superb Minecraft-inspired birthday card illustration, drawn by Tori for her boyfriend, Iggy, last month.

It’s Iggy, returning home to Tori after a hard day’s digging, in a very boxy world! I think this is seriously cute. While this image isn’t featured on her blog yet, you can keep an eye on Tori’s illustrations at IllustrateTor.wordpress.com.

Handmade Star Wars Dress

We’ve featured a few great handmade dresses on Geek Crafts recently – there was the Starfleet dress, the dragon dress, the space dress and the rather bizarre bread tag dress. So here’s another wonderful user submission – a handmade Star Wars dress:

Star Wars Dress by Cation Desgns

Cindy of Cation Designs last year acquired some original Star Wars: A New Hope bed sheets, and did what any crafty science teacher would do: turn them into a dress. And while Cindy is pretty critical of it on her blog, I think we can all agree that it looks incredible.

There are a few other geeky dresses on Cation Designs as well that are worth a look. Check out the Batman Dress or Spiderman Dress, for example. It’s times like this that I wish I owned a sewing machine, knew how to operate one, and had patience in buckets. But then if we could all do this, it wouldn’t be nearly as awesome, would it?!

Han Solo Lego Portrait

Back in April I went along to The Sydney Brick Show: a big Lego event where Lego sculptors bring some of their awesome creations and chat with other fanatics, whilst hundred of little kids run around suffering from excitement overload. I was originally going to write an entire post about the event, but there was just so much awesome stuff there, that I’ve kind had to just cut it down to the best for now. And here you are: Han Solo Lego Pixel Art.

Han Solo Lego Portrait

This incredible portrait of Star Wars’ Han Solo is something like 1 metre squared and is made up of over TWENTY THOUSAND bricks. And they are all those tiny “one-ers” that you miss when clearing up and then stand on days later.

Han wasn’t the only pixel art there. Continue reading Han Solo Lego Portrait