Barnes and Noble Mini Maker Faire Show & Tell

Last day of the #BNMakerFaire Nationwide, we've had so much fun doing the Show and Tell.  As part of the Central Texas Makers, we brought with us many of our homemade projects to this event and we're having so much fun.

Here's a picture or two:

This child is having so much fun play game on a Raspberry Pi tiny computer. Can you believe it, it has over 300 games of several different game console.  Remember the Atari series, Game boy, Nintendo and much more.

Another example of how Raspberry Pi tiny computer is being used is the next photo:

We have a Raspberry Pi running the PiAware software. This uses a SDR (software defined radio) to pick up aircraft transponder information. With the PiAware software, you can see commercial aircraft in the area, with their real-time location and destination. The data get fed to the FlightAware website, which is then used to map flights across the world. One of the benefits of feeding data to FlightAware is that you receive an Enterprise license (which normally costs $90 a month) -- which you can use to get detailed flight data -- real time -- from around the world. If you are interested in aircraft, it's a very inexpensive way to get into flight tracking.

Another fun thing we did is the Electric Cigar Box Guitar... people loved playing with it:

Guest visiting the #BNMakerFaire today enjoyed playing the handmade electric cigar box guitar and many other cool and interesting #maker #project display by #CentralTexasMakers member Ron and Evelyn Nelson
Posted by Central Texas Makers on Saturday, November 7, 2015

It's our last day but it's gonna be awesome. Look forward to seeing y'ah.  Happy Making Day.

PIXZLE™ fun. These children playfully challenged one another

Loved watching them create yesterday during the Austin Mini Maker Faire. 

They came up to the table and immediately there was competition.  I totally enjoyed the back and forth play between them and their parents.  

The boy enlist help with his master piece.  His mother was having so much fun helping him... I didn't realize that more than one person can work together to create something really cool.  

His art piece is of an mining tunnel while the girl did a cat with clouds and a sunset.  Very cool and very creative.  

AWESOME job!   :D  

PIXZLE™ fun. Wow, talk about creativity...both pixel sizes...Sweet!

Awesome creation.  At first I thought why is he using the small pixels in the jumbo demo? 

Silly me, in the mad rush to get everything ready for the Austin Mini Maker Faire; I grabbed jumbo pixels that were within reach therefore, I didn't have yellow jumbo pixels for the demo.  

No problem, he just improvised with the small pixels instead.  I watched him work as he started from the center of with the black jumbo pixels and then started using the small pixels confusion set in as I asked him what he was making.  

He replied, you'll see in a moment.   

As he gradually went around and around moving outwardly people walking by stopped to watch what he was doing.  We all were ever so curious to see what it was... and little by little his design took form and finally he was done.  

There are no other words to describe this except "BEAUTIFUL" just beautiful.

PIXZLE™ fun. This Dude Rocks!!!

Watching him create this lovely work of art, I thought blue, green, black, white and ivory color pixels, I wonder what's he going to make?  

A-ha, now I see... it's like magic.  

Do you recognize this character?

Our booth at Autin Mini Maker Fare

 

Next show Pixzle will be May 24, 2014 

at

Chemical Toy Fare 

at the 

Norris Conference Center 

2525 W. Anderson Ln 78757 

Austin,Texas 

$4-12 & under Free w/adult FREE Parking

Oh, there's gonna be
KIDS CONTEST @ NOON

ADULT CONTEST @ 2PM

ONE DAY ONLY LIVE COPLAY!

AND MUCH MUCH MORE.

Play time with Pixzle Demo

Game on, more like play with us..got the big pixel puzzle art...see yah at ‪http://austinmakerfaire.com/attend/

Making Business cards

Amazing how this day is going... went down to the Travis County Expo Center and the energy there is electrifying.  Seeing so many makers is ever so encouraging.  We drove in, unloaded, and set up our display and what not for tomorrow's main event :D Austin Mini Maker Faire.    Can't wait to see what people are making.
 
Currently making Pixzle ‪pixel‬ business cards...pretty cool heh?!?‪

Packing up Pixzle for Austin Mini Maker Faire

Only hours away from Austin Mini Maker Faire-- getting things packed, to setup in shortly...Lots of pixel kits...

Maps to Austin Mini Maker Faire (May 3rd, 2014)

For the last week or so, we've been working long days to make our latest product Pixzle a reality.  We first unveiled Pixzle at SXSW to see whether or not there was any interest and sure enough the crowd loved it.  Most importantly, was seeing the excitement of children playing with the demo Petite - Pixel Puzzle Art.   They are ever so creative.  Parents had a hard time getting them to return to their family outing and continue to explore the SXSW - Create tent.     After this event ended, we felt that we had something good, well worth pursuing it, and make it available to everyone.

We had a little delay since we both fell sick and took some time to recover.  For the last two weeks we've been working almost around the clock to make all of our designs and introduce a new member to the Pixzle family.    We have much work to do this week to meet our goal to participate and make these lovely artistic kits available for the Austin Mini Maker Faire.   We believe everyone is an artist and providing them with the tools to create their own magic.

I've created an event in both facebook and G+ to make it easier for you to add to #AMMF your calendar: 

Facebook --> https://www.facebook.com/events/242722815916421/
G+ --> https://plus.google.com/u/0/events/cg11sea9gj3or95mc19evr10ma8

Just got the maps of AMMF's arena.. See us at booth #6 in the orange area of the Bizarre Bazaar below.

Here's the map of AMMF outside the arena.

So much to see and do... Thanks to Kami Wilt of Austin Tinkering School who made this possible.  She believed so much in the Austin Maker Community that she was instrumental to bringing back the Mini Maker Faire to Austin.   Best thing the Maker Faire did was to introduce the Mini Maker Faire empowering towns wanting to have their own version.  Kami saw this opportunity and made it happen.  It's been three years in the making and to see AMMF at the Travis County Expo Center excites me because I'm so fond of my first Maker Faire experience which was at the Travis Country Expo Center...we had so much fun learning, making and exploring.   Please join us and have a blast at AMMF this year.   It's bigger and better. Check out the line up at http://austinmakerfaire.com/