Point And Shoot In A Classic Camera Body

If you think there’s a gun inside that camera you’ve been fooled. We just like the juxtaposition of the 1940’s era camera with the iconic sidearms. What you see is a point-and-shoot cameras inside of the classic Leica II body (this is actually a Zorki 1 knockoff). It is much like the Canon AE-1 hack but this time there’s plenty of build details.

Digital camera makers try to get the smallest form factor possible and consequently the inside of those things is a nightmare of tiny parts and intricate connections.The Sony DSC-WX1 is no exception, and even the battery is disassembled to fit inside. See the final product and its features in the video after the break.

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Midi Gloves

We’re being inundated with glove-based peripheral hacks. This is another final project from Cornell, keyboard out of the equation by adding 8 piezo sensors to a pair of gloves thereby shunning the pinky finger. We like this one because it’s easy to build and the midi interface implementation is well documented if you want to build your own.

As you can see after the break, this is easy to use with music software like Garage Band because it is a standard MIDI device. In addition, a MATLAB interface allows for custom mapping in case you want to change what each finger does.

We remember our first introduction to glove-based performances with Tod Machover’s Bug Mudra many years ago. We hope the music input hacks we’re seeing will lead to a whole new generation of music innovators.

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Monitor UV Exposure With Your Sunglasses

Tired of those awful sunburns? [Nikko Knappe’s] UV sensing glasses will warn you before you become crisp and red as a lobster. The bump added to the bridge support hides a TSL230R light frequency sensor. The device automatically switches on when the arms are unfolded and starts tracking cumulative exposure. If it detects a rising UV level, or you are about to burn based on skin type, an LED inside one arm of the frames will flash to inform you.

This has some potential if you think David Brin’s Earth outlines how climate change is really going to play out. Either way it’s still fun and we give bonus points to [Nikko] for disguising the lilypad that controls this as a flowery hair-pin.

Building Air Variable Capacitors

In keeping with our opinion that radio operators were the original electronic hackers here’s a guide to building your own transmitting air variable capacitors. Using some roof flashing, Plexiglas, and various fasteners [David Hammack] was able to make it work. It’s not a perfect solution but he has some ideas to make the next one better. Give this a try after you’re done tweaking your crystals and building input devices.

[Thanks Rich]