Sadly Maker Faire is over for another year, but we had an awesome time and I think this is our best showing to date. We had 8 builders in attendance with their droids (and family), and we presented a builders panel for the first time at the faire.

Between Tammy and I we took over 500 photos/videos, so it was hard to pair it down to a handful to post here, but here goes.

As usual there are many more photos in the gallery.

Saturday started off hectic with booth setup, we had a nice big space with some new banners I had made, parts, plans and a slide show on the table.

For the faire open in earnest, I had big surprise for the builders. I’ve always liked the award tradition that Mike Senna started for R2LA, so I decided to start our tradition. Our first recipient of the Bay Area Builder of the Year went to Matt McCormick who has done an excellent job of helping fellow builders, hosting events and completing his droid. It’ll be up to him to make next year’s award and pick the recipient.

Not to leave everyone else out, I had Dana Powers make special medals say thank you to everyone else for being there this year. Thanks Dana!

One of the children from Friday’s Young Maker Day dropped of this thank you note.

We jacked some of the sign posts with our own addition, and it even made some of the blogs and local papers.

There were a number of Star Wars related craft events, including Bonnie Burton and her friend Terri Hodges, who are there every year with a fun SW project. Matt, John and I took our droids over to say hi and to give Bonnie one of our commemorative medals. Here’s a link to some of Bonnie’s photos from Saturday.

Jackie Nuag also presented a workshop on how to make your own felt R2d2, and we were there to support the effort

There were a lot of cool things to see and were able to stop by some of them

One of the funniest things was that the Maker folks put up signs around Expo Hall to keep the droids out (they think our 2.4GHz radios kills their WiFi). Only a true web geek will get the joke I think

Throughout the weekend we were inundated with people at the booth, it was pretty much like this the entire weekend.

I’m so glad we had stanchions again this year to keep the crowd at bay.

Some people were more obviously SW fans than others. The lights even worked on this home made beanie hat.

This guy had a little R2 he wanted to share

Most children who came by and asked all sorts of great questions, and some took notes

Matt did a great job of getting up close and explaining things

It was very dark in the room, which was a concern at first during Friday’s Young Maker Day, but on Saturday Gerard brought in an awesome lighting rig and the mood created was perfect

We were so busy people were taking photos in parallel at times

Our panel was at the end of Sunday afternoon, but the faire was still going strong and we had a good showing. Matt did a great job of leading the discussion again.

After the panel was done, we hung out to chat further with some future builders

So that’s it for another year – each time we do the faire we get at least one new builder, so next year I can see we could have an even bigger presence.

Johnathan took some awesome pictures of the event too, here’s his blog post and I’ve copied them to my gallery here.

I’ll try and post some additional photos and video in the next week.

Related:

• Maker Faire 2010 – Young Makers Day
• Discovery Day – Washington Elementary School
• Maker Faire 2009
• Maker Faire : Intel Developer Forum
• R2 Maker Faire News Coverage
• Maker Faire – Dance Program
• Maker Faire Photos (2008)
• Maker Faire Award

The Bay Area Maker Faire is almost upon us, and we’ll be there in force with more droids and builders than ever before. Look for us in the Fiesta Hall. We’ll also be participating in Young Makers Day on the Friday, and hosting a builders panel at 4PM on Sunday on the main stage in the Expo Hall.

A couple of weeks ago Matt Mccormick and I headed up to The California Museum in Sacramento to check out a Lucasfilm R2-D2 on display.

At first we thought that it was part of the “Out of this World” / Paul Allen touring collection, but it turned out that it’s part of a separate exhibit to commemorating George Lucas’ entry into The California Hall of Fame at the end of last year.

Until Matt brought it to my attention I had no clue that there was currently an Artoo on display so close to home, so a trip was definitely on the cards. At first, while discussing it with Matt we had thought it maybe a replica because some had reported that it had some strange “features” and was part of the Paul Allen collection, but a quick search of some pictures on the RPF showed that it was almost certainly from the Lucasfilm archive and had some LFL lineage to it.

Matt and I were all over the droid taking as many photos as we could – alas no flashes were allowed making the job hard, and the glass didn’t help

After seeing it in person, I can confirm that it’s the same Artoo from the Magic of Myth (MoM) exhibit which was first shown in San Francisco back in the 90’s, and before that at the Lucasfilm/ILM Model Shop Exhibits at the Marin County Fair which started back in 1988. After seeing some photos of the same droid in the Madrid SW Exhibit last summer, I’d confirmed with Don Bies that this droid has an original aluminum Kenny Baker body with a fiberglass dome, and was assembled originally for the Marin County Fair Exhibit and has been on tour ever since.

In addition to the Artoo, there’s a 3PO on display as well as some Indiana Jones props, original Lucas scripts and some token Clone Wars concept art.

I must have looked at the photos from the MoM a thousand times but never noticed some of it’s oddities until I saw it in person.

• He’s shorter in stature than normal due to shortened legs that have been pushed into the ankles.
• Because of the shortened legs, the body is sitting on the battery boxes (which helps with stability on display.)
• Dome appears to be aluminum, but is painted fiberglass.
• Paint is very good, especially the white, so parts were probably repainted at some point.
• Leg to body hubs thinner than normal, which pulls the legs tight to the body.
• Shoulder Horseshoes seem a bit too thin as well.
• Shoulder Buttons stick out a lot more than I remember, but this maybe due to the thin horseshoes.
• Round inside edge of the horseshoes have no detail/ridges.
• There’s a silver plate on top of the lower half circle where the hoses enter the battery boxes.
• Dome doesn’t look like it will rotate as it’s flat on the body.
• Utility Arms are thin sheet metal.

Here’s samples of my photos, the rest can be found in the gallery here, and Matt’s write up can be found here and his photos are here.

I also shot some video and will try and post it in the next couple of days.

Here’s some more photos of the Mystery Box, I’m sure most of you guessed it was to store a dome.

It was made by Matt Mccormick for our trip down to R2LA this past weekend. Thanks Matt!

Related:

• Mystery Box

A couple of people have asked about the replacement 2.5″ wheels I got for my front foot setup back in May from California Caster.

The soft rubber wheels are made by Darnell-Rose, and product number/markings on them show “Darnell Corp X-6 2 1-2 Calf.”. Unfortunately, I can’t find my original receipt nor the wheel in Darnell’s catalog or California Caster’s website. If I find it I’ll try and remember to update this post, but I think if you call up and say X-6 2- 1-2, you be okay.

oh! and a point of clarification, I’m still using the original Proctor Glove / Arrow Hardware caster assembly

Left: Original Proctor Glove wheel – shaved down to 2.5″
Middle: New Darnell wheel
Right: Full Proctor Glove 3″ caster

If your name is not Matt, can you guess what this is?

And no, it’s not a hat box and I’m sure you’ve guessed by now

Answer: Dome Travel Box

Previous Mystery Box

Nearly ever droid builder I know lugs around a large cart just in case their droid fails. This is especially needed for those of us with drive systems that lock when no powered is applied to the motors. Knock on wood, I’ve never needed to use my cart and it’s always stayed in the van.

Well, at WonderCon last week Gerard showed us his latest find – mini 6″ tri-wheel dollies that’s can easily be place under each drive wheel. They’re small and light enough to throw in your backpack or toolbox.

Only downside is the wheels are pretty small so wouldn’t go over any major bumps or door jams easily, and I wouldn’t recommend using them to totally replace your cart, especially if you use it all the time. Never the less, I went straight out and bought a set to have in case of an emergency.

Here’s Gerard in action pushing his droid around on two of these

[Direct link to Youtube video]

Manufacturer: Sheperd Hardware
Mode Number: 9299
Approx Price: $9

Available at Home Depot, Ace Hardware, etc. Cheapest online location: Ace Hardware Outlet ($5 ea.)

The fourth annual Maker Faire is just around the corner (May 30th), it will showcase individual creativity and grassroots innovation in the largest festival devoted to DIY culture and technology in the country. We’re hoping to be there again with our droids, if you’re interested in joinng us drop me an email.

It’s kind of hard to describe the event, but PC Magazine put it pretty well “Maker Faire is an improbable mixture of spectacle and practicality–a combination of engineering, crafts, science, and art that seemed to sufficiently blur the lines between all four.”

[more info]

Related:

• Maker Faire : Intel Developer Forum
• R2 Maker Faire News Coverage
• Maker Faire – Dance Program
• Maker Faire Photos
• Maker Faire Award