If you want to become a great robotics engineer, then you need to start out small, and this robot is a great first-time project. It's the simplest kind of robot, with only one motor and a gear box, but it moves really interesting, capable of shimmying across a rope. You can se ...more
Learn how a small robot-like toy can be an endless supply of fun for a dog...and apparently the humans who own them.
This scorpion toy was constructed by Make Magazine with a Twitchie Robot Kit. If you're afraid of real life scorpions this friendly toy might help you get used to them. His plush body is made from some fabric aiming to make him look like an Arizona bark scorpion, which are tan ...more
The Lego Mindstorms system may seem like a toy at first, but it is actually a very powerful robotics system used by universities, schools, hobbiests, and kids alike. Learn how to use the Lego Mindstorms NXT editing and programming software to program movements for your robot. ...more
The Lego Mindstorms system may seem like a toy at first, but it is actually a very powerful robotics system used by universities, schools, hobbiests, and kids alike. The NXT Brick is the basic component of the NXT system - learn how to use it to build robots and program or che ...more
It may be intended as a toy, but this gizmo can be hacked for more than just watching a remote-controlled car's video spy cam. This HUD (heads-up display) comes with the Wild Planet Spy Gear Video Car, but it's said that you can purchase the video headset separately. And it's ...more
As the best-selling toy of all time, the odds of you once playing with a Rubik's Cube are pretty high. And if you're like me, or even the cube's inventor Erno Rubik, your first attempts likely ended in futility. Every twist, every turn, the cube just gets more and more mixed u ...more
One of the greatest things about the internet? Free papercraft downloads. Enjoy Botropolis' collection of 50 fun robots. Just download, print, and assemble. My top ten favorites below. Wall-E. Robocop. Optimus Prime. R2-D2. The Terminator. Poseable Toy Robot. Retro Bot. Godzi ...more
Sparky is a wireless, web-based video-chat robot from the Gomi Style crew. You can learn how to make your own Autonomous Telepresence robot using spare computer parts, some old toys and a bit of custom software (that we provide at gomistyle.com). This robot is operated with a ...more
Love bubbles but hate the toil and trouble of using your own lungs to blow them? Allow us to introduce Bubblebot, the latest Arduino-powered toy to attain celebrity status on Instructables. It's not an easy project by any means—even the Basilique du Sacré-Cœur has fewer steps. ...more
Yankee ingenuity is a trait we hold in the highest regard here at Wonderhowto. So imagine our delight in sharing Afrigadget, whose tagline is: "solving everyday problems with African ingenuity". Bending scrap wire into clever and functional toys is but one hallmark of any res ...more
K'NEX is the world's most famous constructive toy, which means you can build just about anything. You can take the K'NEX plastic pieces and build all kinds of contraptions, everything from boats to airplanes to robots to weapons. Watch this video tutorial to see how to build ...more
K'NEX is the world's most famous constructive toy, which means you can build just about anything. You can take the K'NEX plastic pieces and build all kinds of contraptions, everything from boats to airplanes to robots to weapons. Watch this two-part video tutorial to see how ...more
K'NEX is the world's most famous constructive toy, which means you can build just about anything. You can take the K'NEX plastic pieces and build all kinds of contraptions, everything from boats to airplanes to robots to weapons. Watch this two-part video tutorial to see how ...more
K'NEX is the world's most famous constructive toy, which means you can build just about anything. You can take the K'NEX plastic pieces and build all kinds of contraptions, everything from boats to airplanes to robots to weapons. Watch this two-part video tutorial to see how ...more
K'NEX is the world's most famous constructive toy, which means you can build just about anything. You can take the K'NEX plastic pieces and build all kinds of contraptions, everything from boats to airplanes to robots to weapons. Watch this video tutorial to see how to build ...more
K'NEX is the world's most famous constructive toy, which means you can build just about anything. You can take the K'NEX plastic pieces and build all kinds of contraptions, everything from boats to airplanes to robots to weapons. Watch this video tutorial to see how to build ...more
PopSci has compiled an amazing list of 30 college labs that would tempt anybody to re-enroll. If you know any high school juniors or prospective grad students, pass this along. They just might reconsider their initial choices. 30 courses are pictured below, click through to P ...more
Chris Burden's latest piece is a portrait of L.A.'s hot mess of traffic, entitled Metropolis II. The artist has constructed a miniature highway system, complete with 1,200 custom-designed cars, 18 lanes, 13 toy trains and tracks, and a landscape of buildings made with wood blo ...more
I have an absolutely wonderful time making projects and writing articles for all of you mad scientists! Today, I will bring you behind the scenes for a look at the workbench, tools, and software that make the Mad Science World possible. Above is my beautiful workbench! My who ...more
To build a robot suit you will need a football toy chest, a medium sized trash can, two old camera flashes, heater vent cover, two old Sega Genesis controllers, a big lamp shade, a big sheet of cardboard, dryer vent hose, plastic scale, old "Go-bots" brand 110 camera, spray pa ...more
A CNC router machine is probably the most useful tool a hobbyist can own, but the price for a CNC machine on the market is way more than the average hobbyist is willing to spend. You can build your own CNC with very basic tools, little knowledge of machinery, mechanics, or ele ...more
If you or someone you know has younger kids and you're looking for an augmented reality toy, Pai Technology has just the educational option for you. For $199, the toy maker offers Augie, a spherical robot that uses augmented reality to teach children the basics of programming ...more
How much screen time is too much for a child? Should you let your children have a smartphone or tablet? What age is appropriate to introduce them to technology? These are just a few tough questions parents face. Research has shown that kids age 8-12 spend up to six hours a da ...more
Already a dominant force at the box office, Marvel Studios appears intent on establishing itself as the ruler of augmented reality media as well. After licensing Iron Man to Hasbro for the Hero Vision Iron Man AR Helmet as a tie-in to Avengers: Infinity War, Marvel has return ...more
You have to see this amazing tutorial on how to make a WALL-E toy from junk just lying around your house. Literally. This is ingenious! Filth Wizardry: Home made recycled WALL-E. He's a cutie, and the great thing with this was that because Wall-e is a battered old robot, you d ...more
I love robots. They have the potential to evolve into Asimovian destroyers of the human species, but have only just mastered the art of cleaning my rug. They have an ever increasing cool factor and a growing number of cheap and simple components that let the hobby roboticist r ...more
Arachnophilia and technosexuals rejoice. This whimsical, skittering robot takes only 5 minutes of tinkering. This simple toy is made possible with a bit of solder, AAA battery, copper wire and an old mobile phone's vibrating motor. Like the EvilMadScientist's Bristlebot, this ...more
If you want to quickly understand EtherWars, imagine a game like StarCraft where you build out your base on your living room floor instead of on a computer screen. Before we had computer games to help us imagine what space wars might feel like, we played with toy ships and use ...more
The marketing team for Marvel Studios is doing "whatever it takes" to make sure you see Avengers: Endgame when it hits theaters in a couple of weeks, including offering an updated set of augmented reality Playmoji for the Playground app on Google Pixel. Included in an update ...more
On Monday, toy maker Merge virtually blasted its way into CES 2018 with a new tech-meets-toys innovation in the form of an augmented reality gun controller for use with smartphone-powered first-person shooter apps. The 6DoF Blaster (6DoF refers to "six degrees of freedom"), a ...more
Augmented reality content makers often position the technology as a new storytelling medium. And who loves stories more than children? Available now in the App Store as a free download with in-app purchases for additional content, Wonderscope uses ARKit to place content, whic ...more
The year is 2018. You just received your own Magic Leap One: Creator Edition. What now? Rewinding back to today, we know of one specific app that will be available for Magic Leap's device, along with two others that could be tagged as highly likely. Paired with Magic Leap's o ...more
If you're a regular reader of Next Reality, you're more likely to spread the joy of augmented reality than most others. But it can be difficult to introduce newbies into the AR fold if you don't give them exactly the right starting point in terms ease-of-use and affordability. ...more
The Autobots and Decepticons are back as Transformers: Forged to Fight has soft-launched for both iOS and Android. Help Optimus Prime fight corrupted Transformers one on one to save them from their ruthless overlords, and have them join your cause, regardless of which side the ...more
For my money, one of the greatest improvements brought about from the smartphone revolution is the advent of visual voicemail. No longer do we have to slog through dial menus or trudge through every single message to get to the next. We can just look at our messages, right the ...more
Toymaker Lego has been on board with building AR into its playsets and mobile apps since the launch of ARKit. Its latest product takes the brand's approach to combining physical toys and virtual content and remixes it for a generation obsessed with the kind of homegrown music ...more
I'm starting to wonder if the people at Boston Dynamics have ever watched a Terminator movie. Not just because the robotics company with the oxymoronic name develops machines that are able to move around environments with animal- and human-like agility, but because the people ...more
The surging activity in augmented reality in both the business and consumer sectors is being matched with a wealth of updates and partnerships from Snap Inc. On Thursday, during the company's Snap Partner Summit 2021, a wide range of tie-ups and new features were unveiled, wi ...more
Amazon really wants to make itself at home in your home. Like, everywhere in your home, from your doorstep to your kitchen, your kids' rooms, and everywhere in between. During a virtual press event on Tuesday, the company unveiled a veritable cornucopia of new smart home devi ...more
Smartphone gaming continues to improve with ever sharper displays and raw processing power to deliver console-quality graphics right in the palm of your hands. Nonetheless, you still stand to improve the gaming experience on any phone by adding the right accessories to the mix ...more
The latest film addition in the American-produced Millennium series, The Girl in the Spider's Web, was just released on Blu-ray a few days ago. As you could expect, the movie has many hacking scenes throughout, just like the previous English and Swedish language movies centere ...more