Tag: BayLUG

We had a great time at Maker Faire again this year.

We had a train layout like usual, around 23 feet square, featuring a city downtown, CJ’s Hollywood diorama, a suburban area, farm, Bruce’s 10 foot bridge, rail yard with lots of rolling stock on display, James’s Goofy Train, and a new feature, with Jim and James collaborating on a double-figure-eight loop with Mindstorms control preventing any wrecks at the crossover tracks, and featuring Jim’s Hogwarts castle diorama. In addition we had several tables along the perimeter of the room with several items on display, including Jim’s Mindstorms/pneumatic calculator. Click the big picture to go to the set page on Flickr, or click on an individual photo. Or, you can view a slideshow of the photos. I also had a chance to wander around Maker Faire and take pictures of some of what I saw. You can find those pictures on Flickr (slideshow) as well.

[tags]lego,baylug,bayltc,makerfaire,makerfaire2007[/tags]

This weekend, BayLUG will be taking part in Maker Faire, a celebration of creativity – from electronics to sculpture to sewing. We took part in it last year (see my blog entry including pictures from that event) and will have a bigger, better layout this year! Come by and say hi![tags]lego, makerfaire, baylug, bayltc[/tags]

Wow, this has been a great show! It’s quite different from the train shows we (BayLTC) usually do. The Maker Faire crowd is a very diverse group of artists, geeks, and craftspeople. Plus, a lot of families with kids which is just like what we’re used to. One of my favorite things about the LEGO hobby is when little kids are staring through the “sneeze guards” at our layout with their eyes and mouths open, and just about the only thing they can say is “wooooaaahhh.” That’s fun.

Unlike the train shows we have a lot more non-train stuff at this show. David brought in his big crane (it’s about 12 feet tall, entirely made of unglued LEGO bricks, mostly Technic), and an assortment of other Technic creations including pneumatic walkers and an inclined cog railway. I also brought in the only sculpture I currently have assembled, my Maneki Neko (Japanese good luck cat) statue.

I haven’t had a chance to take many pictures, but we shot an hour of video, including an interview of me at the Yahoo Answers stage which was a lot of fun. Hopefully I can edit that down to a reasonable size and make a little video of the Faire. I am planning to take a lot of stills tomorrow, and will post those on Flickr in the next few days.

If you come by the BayLUG layout at Maker Faire today (Sunday, April 23) please stop by and say hi!

Next weekend (April 22-23) is Maker Faire, an event featuring “the MythBusters, and thousands of tech DIY enthusiasts, crafters, educators, tinkerers, hobbyists, science clubs, students, and authors,” put on by the publishers of MAKE Magazine. This event is kind of like a giant science fair for grownups, mixed with an art show and all kinds of stuff. I don’t really know what to expect but we’re planning to treat it pretty much the same way we do the train shows.

We have a space that’s 30 feet square, which will feature a train layout and some additional non-train LEGO exhibits such as David Wegmuller’s giant Technic crane.

I’ve been frantically busy “making” things for the Faire all weekend. But last night I seem to have caught a cold. The worst part is the difficulty sleeping. And I don’t have the strength to build much LEGO even though I am home sick from work.

Also I want to apologize for the dearth of posts lately. Holly and I went to Charleston, SC for a week last month and when we got back, I was quite busy with regular life and just didn’t get back into the swing of things in the blog. But I’m going to start posting more soon, I promise!!