Hackaday’s premiere European hardware conference returns for the third time on May 9th, 2020, bringing together talks, workshops, hardware hacking, food and drink, entertainment, and of course the best gathering of hardware geeks you’ll find anywhere. It’s awesome, because you’re awesome — and I do mean you. Whether you’re submitting a talk proposal or just grabbing a ticket to make this the first conference you’ve ever been to, we can’t do it without you.
Hackaday’s Home in Serbia
We’ll be at Dom Omladine again this year. The venue has feels like a home for Hackaday with a large space for talks, a workshop area, and a huge open area for lobby-con where you’ll find Belgrade’s finest baristas, a great spread of food, and a beer tap to keep the day rolling. Bring along your hardware projects to hack alongside the conference’s custom hardware badge designed by Voja Antonic as we open up the bar and get the live IDM sets started.
Flooding into Hackaday Belgrade
Breakfast spread as the doors open
What is better than hacking to live music?
It’s still early in our planning (these are Early Bird tickets after all) but it’s very likely we’ll have a meetup the night before the conference. Friends old and new often get together on Sunday to keep the fun going. On Saturday, doors for the conference will open around 9 am and the fun will continue well beyond the 2 am “official” end. We recommend you make travel plans to include the full weekend.
Elliot Williams demos Logic Noise live on stage
Don’t just ask for Friday off of work, bring your friends and co-workers along with you. If you’re most comfortable digging through datasheets while a hot soldering iron idles on your bench and a 3D-printer whirs away in the corner, Hackaday Belgrade is calling you. I encourage those who were at the first two events in 2016 and 2018 to share their stories below.
Don’t miss this one, it only comes around in even-numbered years and tickets will sell out.
Hackaday Belgrade 2020 Posters by Aleksandar Bradic (click for full size download link):
We’ve all seen acoustic levitation, it’s one of the scientific novelties of our age and a regular on the circuit of really impressive physical demonstrations of science to the public. The sight of arrays of ultrasonic speakers causing small objects and beads of liquid to float in mid-air without any suspension is magical, captivating people of all ages. Thus a lecture at Hackaday Belgrade on the subject from Asier Marzo, a research scientist with a speciality in the field of ultrasonics at the UK’s University of Bristol, was a particularly fascinating and informative one.
He started by explaining acoustic levitation as a concept, and its mechanism. As an idea it’s one with a long history, he tells us that hundreds of years ago people tried mass ranks of the loudest musical instruments at their disposal to move rocks, all to no avail. The array of musicians of yore lacked the ability to control their individual phase, and of course their combined output would have balked at a pea-sized piece of gravel, let alone a boulder.
Explaining the standing wave produced by an ultrasonic array.
The Power of Standing Waves
Given that we can now create standing waves between phased arrays of ultrasonic speakers, he explained the mechanism that allows the levitation. The standing wave creates patterns of high intensity and “quiet” low intensity sound, and the object nestles in one of these quiet areas. There is thus a size limit dictated by the wavelength of the sound in question, which for the ultrasound he’s using is in the order of a few millimetres.
Having explained how it all works, we were then taken into the fields in which it finds an application. This was particularly interesting, because it’s the side we never see in the for-the-kids demos where it’s all about “Look, we can make the water droplet float!”. The number of fields that can find a use for it was a surprise, and formed the next phase of the talk.
Real World Uses for Acoustic Levitation
The first example given was in the field of spectroscopy, when reflecting light from a droplet of liquid on a substrate a certain amount of the reflected light comes from the substrate. If the sample is levitated, all the reflection comes from it and nothing else. Microgravity experiments are another interesting application, where it is possible to replicate some of the work that has previously required the environment of a space craft such as the International Space Station. This was a particularly unexpected twist.
Manipulating a solid particle with a wearable array.
The technique can be used for tiny particles in a liquid medium with a much higher frequency — a demonstration involves moving a single blood cell in a pattern. But Asier has more tricks up his sleeve. This technique can be used in human interactions with computers and with the real world. We saw a display in which the pixels were small plastic balls suspended in a grid, they could even be flipped in colour by being rotated under an electric field. A successive display used the balls not in a grid but as a point cloud in a graph, proving that rasters are not the only means of conveying information. Finally we saw the arrays applied to wearable devices, a handheld tractor beam, and a set of standing wave tweezers. He gave the example of picking up an SMD component, something that we can see would be invaluable.
Levitation is Within Our Grasp
The good news for us is that this is a piece of cutting-edge science that is accessible to us at our level too. He’s made a selection of designs available online through the Acoustic Levitator site. There is an ultrasonic array, an acoustic levitator, and an acoustic tractor beam, and the components are such run-of-the-mill parts as Arduinos and motor driver boards. Even schoolchildren building them from kits, with an experimenter using one for Schlieren photography of the acoustic field. Finally we’re shown Ultraino, an ambitious project providing software and driver hardware for large arrays in which every transducer is individually driven, before a tantalising look at future work in fluid ultrasonics and the promise of an ultrasonic audio speaker project.
Hackaday covers a huge array of projects and topics from all corners of our community. Each one is exciting in its own way, from a simple-looking Arduino project that encapsulates a cool hack to a multi-year labour of love. It’s not often though that we can say we’ve seen a genuinely cutting-edge piece of science, while simultaneously having it explained in terms we understand and being given an accessible version that we can experiment with ourselves. We are really looking forward to the projects that will come from this direction, as acoustic levitation becomes yet another known quantity in the hardware hacker’s armoury.
Hackers, Designers, and Engineers flooded into Dom Omladine on Saturday for what can only be described as an epic celebration of hardware culture. This is the second time Hackaday has organized a huge conference in Belgrade, and lightning really did strike twice.
A Gathering of New Friends and Old
We got things started off with a meetup the night before the conference. The first Hackaday Belgrade was held in 2016 and we didn’t reserve a bar on Friday night — we ended up taking over one just through sheer numbers. This year we called ahead for a large outdoor space, then made good use of it.
A great kickoff to the weekend
LED cube animation emulation demo
*No beers were wasted during this meetup
Everyone was giddy with anticipation of the next day to come. There is always a sizzling energy of meeting up in real life. Most of this group hangs out on Hackaday.io, but only some of them have met in person. Add to that the reunions of those who became friends at the previous Hackaday Belgrade and at other cons around Europe and you have the feeling of coming home. These really are your people.
Yes, a Conference. But the Cool Kind
Hackaday conferences are more than just parties… they’re conferences. If you approach it the right way you can get your employer on board with you attending because you’re going to meet incredible people, learn lots of stuff, and come back excited to take on the Universe. Actually, bring your boss along for the ride too!
Flooding into Hackaday Belgrade
Breakfast spread as the doors open
This year we had thirteen incredible talks. As is our practice, we started off with a super-technical talk as Rachel Wong (aka @konichiwakitty) discussed her Ph.D research which involves growing eye tissue in the lab. But like all incredibly brilliant minds, she has a creative outlet which she also covered as part of her Keynote address. Rachel has a passion for building wearables that are reaching for the future by embracing things we really do need in our garments and gear.
Main hall packed for the keynote address
The workshop area full to the brim
From drone monitoring networks to robot soldering machines, and concepts for designing meaningful hardware to using code to automate tedious PCB layout, there was plenty in these talks for everyone.
Rachel Wong on the growing of eye tissue
Elliot Williams demos Logic Noise live on stage
I really enjoyed Elliot Williams’ talk on Logic Noise for his live demos using simple logic chips to build up complex music. Marcel van Kervinck took us on a journey of TTL computer design. And Sophi Kravitz’s talk on building non-rigid airships had at least two people at the con get inspired and spin their own blimp design during the conference! There was a live-feed of the talks so keep your eye on Hackaday as we pull those out to be featured individually.
Some of the demo hardware: Acoustic levitation for lab work
The workshops were standing room only as people who weren’t able to grab a ticket audited the course. We had three hands-on session that built wearable circuitry, brough art to PCB design, and dove into the world of FPGAs.
Welcome, Here’s Your Neck-Mounted Retro Computer
Everyone through the door received a custom electronic badge to hack on during Hackaday Belgrade. Voja Antonic designed the hardware and oversaw the manufacture. We had excellent yield which is great because we had nearly (if not more than) 100% attendance at the conference. We ended the day with just 5 badges to spare!
These handheld computers are truly hot! The badges each have 55 really clicky keys. With at least 350 people in the room, that’s approaching 20k momentary push switches and at one point, a brief “silence” fell and all that could be heard were clicking buttons. That and we asked everyone to play the Mario Overworld tune at the same time as hundreds of badges rose in a glorious chorus. There’s also a 16-page user manual to go along with them which included sample code to get started.
Hacking went on throughout the day but as the talk session wrapped up we transformed the hall into a Hacker Village. Tables were brought in and immediately filled. Live music filled the room as Bogdan Rosu and Richard Hogben each played IDM sets. If you’ve been watching Hackaday videos you’ve heard their work and their performances this night were epic.
What is better than hacking to live music?
Still going strong as midnight approaches
Rich and Bogdan join forces for the final live music set
So much hacking, so little time
Head to head game called ‘Shoot my Valentine’
Head to head Tic Tac Toe
There were other hardware demos on display too
This badge was put on WiFi by lunchtime
[Flummer]’s badge displays minimalist style
Detail of [Larissa Koncz]’s Interactive Poetic Glove from the workshop
The world’s slowest sinewave, calculated in BASIC: [Tom van Dijk]
So much ASCII art!
[Frederic] and [Manoel] got their badges talking over AFSK, when the RF interference didn’t get them…
The RevSpace crew at work in the quiet workshop room
There was food, there was beer, and there were the tools of our lifestyle; laptops, programmers, jumper wires, blinky add-ons, and the excitement that goes along with all of them. The badge hacking presentations began at midnight and the place was still alive with excitement. It is truly great to see how supportive our community is of exploring hardware and trying things out. Publish your badge hacks and stories from the conference on Hackaday.io as we’ll be featuring those in the coming days and want to make sure we have all the juicy details.
Why Belgrade?
Keep your eye on Hackaday as there is much more coverage to come on this wonderful event. Many have asked: “Why Belgrade?”. It’s a fantastic city and the engineering community in the area is passionate about getting together to learn and share ideas. This includes the Supplyframe engineers who live in Belgrade and did the heavy lifting to organize and staff Hackaday Belgrade. You all did an amazing job and everyone at the con owes you a debt of gratitude, thank you so much! We also want to thank Supplyframe and SevenBridges, our sponsors for the event.
To all who attended, it wouldn’t have happened without you! I can speak for everyone on the Hackaday crew in saying the culture we share is energizing, encouraging, and humbling. It’s exactly the kind of recharge everyone looks for to keep life interesting! We’ll see you at the next one. Now over the next five months we have our sights set on the Hackaday Superconference. See you there!
Good morning Hackaday universe! Hackaday Belgrade 2018 has just started, and we’re knee-deep in sharing, explaining, and generally celebrating our craft. But just because you’re not here doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t take part.
Greetings from beautiful Belgrade! With the Hackaday crew arriving over the last couple of days, preparations are in full swing, and the excitement is building for Hackaday Belgrade 2018 on Saturday. Here’s all the news you need to know.
If you’re looking for something to do in town this weekend, don’t miss [Brian Benchoff]’s Ode to Belgrade and especially some great local info in the comments. From which taxis to take, to finding a hardware store, to touring monuments of brutalist architecture, this post has it all.
And last but not least, the badges are in the final stages of production. [Voja] and [Mike] are temporarily distracted by watching themselves on N1, the Serbian CNN affiliate, for which they were interviewed this morning about hacker culture, and about building badge hardware and writing the firmware for it. They’ll get back to epoxying speakers and writing code any time now.
In short, Hackaday Belgrade is a sold-out, unstoppable force of nature. We’re so excited to be here and can’t wait to see you all on Saturday!
The hardware badge for the Hackaday Belgrade conference is a Retro Computer that you wear around your neck. I have one in my hands and it’s truly a work of art. It’s beautiful, it’s fun to play with, and it will be an epic platform for a glorious weekend of badge hacking! Check out the first look video, then join me below as I drill down into the details.
Get your ticket now for Hackaday Belgrade, our premier European hardware conference at the end of this month. It’s a day filled with talks, works, food, fun, and of course everyone through the door gets one of these incredible badges. The best part is the community that turns out for this event and that includes the Hacker Village that takes hold in the evening. We’ll be hacking the badges until the wee hours of the morning alongside hardware demos, presentations, lightning talks, and live IDM and DJ sets.
In two weeks the Hackaday Community is gathering in Belgrade for Europe’s greatest hardware con, The Hackaday Belgrade Conference — an event not to be missed — but of course the city itself is a spectacular place to visit and has the perfect feel for those who like to build electronics. Why not join us for your own geek world tour to Serbia? Here’s a few of the things you’ll want to see while in Belgrade.
Belgrade is a tech center and a hidden jewel of Europe. Need proof? Fly into Belgrade, and you’ll land at Nikola Tesla Airport. Pick up a car at the airport and you’ll pass a great glass torus housing Serbia’s Museum of Aviation. Here, you’ll find aircraft from both sides of the cold war, Sabres and MiGs, Hurricanes and Messerschmitts, a quite rare Sud Caravelle, and the canopy of the only stealth bomber ever to be shot down. It’s an aviation geek’s paradise, and you haven’t even left the airport.
What else is in store for you when you visit Belgrade? For the Hackaday crowd, the most interesting bit will probably be the Nikola Tesla Museum. You might know of Nikola Tesla from a webcomic, but he’s actually the greatest inventor of all time, even more so than Elon Musk. Tesla invented radio, even though Marconi got the credit. Tesla invented radar and discovered x-rays. The only person they could find to portray a figure like Tesla in The Prestige was David Bowie. Nikola Tesla is the most iconic inventor to ever live (change my mind), and his museum is in Belgrade.
![[Flummer]'s badge displays minimalist style](https://i0.wp.com/hackaday.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/dscf0774.jpg?w=242&h=182&ssl=1 "DSCF0774")
![Detail of [Larissa Koncz]'s Interactive Poetic Glove from the workshop](https://i0.wp.com/hackaday.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/dscf0785.jpg?w=242&h=181&ssl=1 "DSCF0785")
![The world's slowest sinewave, calculated in BASIC: [Tom van Dijk]](https://i0.wp.com/hackaday.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/dscf0776.jpg?w=225&h=168&ssl=1 "DSCF0776")
![[Frederic] and [Manoel] got their badges talking over AFSK, when the RF interference didn't get them...](https://i0.wp.com/hackaday.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/dscf0748_bright.png?w=126&h=168&ssl=1 "DSCF0748_bright")
