Nyancat party

Update: 11/26/11

I made nyancake! It was more difficult than I thought it would be. “In other news this week, hall thanksgiving feast. Nyancake makes its appearance. Trickier than I thought. Sprinkles did not turn out at all (too fine featured), cake should not be too moist (add flour). Bake at ~325F for ~1.5hrs, then (when brown on “top”) pull out and invert. Let cool for ten or twenty minutes, then gently shake out. Make sure to use cooking spray as mold release!” This used $17 worth of food-grade silicone, and I just barely made it by adding a top to the mold with foam to displace the silicone where it wasn’t needed in the mold.

As a whole, jello is much more recommended, but has more limited post-processing (aka adding food coloring / frosting) options.

More pics: https://picasaweb.google.com/nancy.ouyang/Nyancake?authuser=0&feat=directlink

Update: 11/02/11

I finally managed to not eat poptarts long enough to drag them from Shaw’s, the grocery store, to the media lab shop (this has taken me 2 months, hah). Now I have replicated the work of http://www.lvl1.org/2011/07/15/new-laser-cutter/ and created laser-etched nyancat poptarts!

MATERIAL:        LENS:    THICKNESS:    PPI:     POWER (%):    SPEED (%):    EFFECT (cut/etch)

Poptart            2    n/a        500    40%        80%        Light raster (will cut through sugar but not burn poptart)
Poptart            2    n/a        500    40%        50%        Medium raster (will cut through sugar and lightly singe poptart)
Poptart            2    n/a        500    76%        50%        Strong raster (will cut through sugar and darkly singe poptart)

on the universal laser x2-600 (co2, 100w).

=====

An update from rapid-prototyping land.
I have access to a shopbot and CNC mill now, which means I can now create infinity nyancats!

(there was this really awkward moment in the media lab shop where these sponsor-y people walked in and looked around and took pictures. While I had nyancat on my screen and I was using this 50k shopbot 3d axis mill to … cut internet memes out of foam).


Foam to smooth-on liquid silicone (in this case, mold star slow, which has a long pot time to work with — 50 mins — but takes 4 hours to cure. the quick-curing oomoo 25 was out) to drystone final (similar to plaster — a white powder, mix with water and let stand for a few hours). No release agents needed at any step, although I had to pry the silicone out of the foam, destroying the mold a bit.

Final drystone version had bad surface finish due to the bad surface finishing on the foam (I was trying to cut down on my shopbot milling time) — professor suggested coating foam version in gesso next time to create a better finish. I also lost a sprinkle on the foam somewhere, and was not careful enough pouring the drystone into the silicone mold as you can tell from the uneven depth of the sprinkles.

Aluminum paperweight (engraved on a CNC mill) > oomax silicone (cured in ~1hr) > drystone (cured in ~1hr) and a black smooth-on plastic (cured in 15 mins). There are tiny bubbles in the silicone version along the raised lines, probably because I needed to be more careful making sure the oomax poured all the way into the tiny etched grooves.

Software toolchain:

google images (nyancat) > Solidworks (3d model / dxf) > MasterCAM for the aluminum paperweight, Partworks for the shopbot foam mold.

More details here:
http://orangenarwhals.blogspot.com/2011/10/nyancat-party-in-aluminum-egg-foam.html

and more pictures here:

Nyanmold: https://picasaweb.google.com/nancy.ouyang/MAS863Week6MoldingAndCasting?authuser=0&feat=directlink

Nyantart:  https://picasaweb.google.com/nancy.ouyang/Nyantart?authuser=0&feat=directlink

Makerships! (free project money!) apps due Oct 11

Update– now we’re awarding $750 in total! Thanks to techfair — techfair.mit.edu 🙂

MITERS wants to give you money (“makerships”) to work on your own projects.
Apply here by Tuesday the 11th (it’s a short and sweet form):
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/viewform?formkey=dDViZV9TVng0dFRWQ3pMVzI0aDVOdUE6MQ

The details follow…

Makerships:
We want to give you money for your projects. We’re allocating $500 a
semester toward grants for student (undergraduates only for now)
projects. (So requesting up to $100 or $200 is within reason, although
smaller requests are more likely to be granted).

MITERS:
MIT Electronics Research Society (http://miters.mit.edu)
Originally founded as a club to give MIT students free and open access
to computers, MITERS now features a mill, lathe, band saws, welders*,
and other hands-on tools, in addition to a host of oscilloscopes,
high-end soldering irons, and other EE prototyping tools. It’s a
member-run creative haven and build-anything-you-want,
if-you-break-it,-fix-it space.
*currently out of operation, we’re working on fixing

Key Dates:
* Oct 11 — Last day of Columbus weekend — application deadline
* Oct 14 — Winners notified
* Dec 16 — (tentative) MEETERS (MITERS End of Every Term Research Showcase)

Terms:
* Undergraduate (any school, as long as you come hang out at MITERS)
* Work on the project at MITERS as much as possible
* Present at MEETERS (probably Dec 16th)
* Maintain good documentation of their work as you progress. On your
website or on the MITERS website is fine. (this is good for your
future/present portfolio too)

Judging: Names will be stripped from proposals, then I’ll email
everyone on the miters-keyholders list (about 20 people) for voting
and discussion (coolness / technicality will come into play here).
Final decisions will be made at general meeting Friday Oct. 14th
(affirmative action in encouraging new makers / underclassmen will
come into play here*), and winners notified by that Saturday (Oct
15th).

*Yes, I am explicitly stating that you should not be intimidated by x
crazy project you see on the MITERS site. All you really need is
enthusiasm for making things — the rest will come naturally as you
ask people at MIT / MITERS for help with your crazy idea. 🙂

===FAQ===
Why: We are funding this to convince more people to join MITERS and/or
build things.

Money distribution: You would come to Friday build parties (every
Friday @ 7pm @ MITERS) and pull up website(s) for us to order your
parts from. This way we cut through the reimbursement craziness and
don’t even step near cash-grant sinkholes. If you absolutely want your
part but can’t make it, I’ll create a spreadsheet doc that our
treasurer, tylerc, can check.

Build parties: Basically, a bunch of people who like making things
comes to hang out at MITERS. No dancing involved [yet].

Majors: We don’t care what major you are. And we’re definitely not
pure 6-1. We’re self-funded, so not directly tied to any department.

Questions? Email nouyang at mittt or miters-keyholders at mittt

If you want a copy of what you submitted here, just email me and/or
save it elsewhere before you submit.

Cheers,
–Nancy Ouyang