I had the joy of working on the team that created the effigy for the 2019 Bequinox Burning Man regional event in Los Angeles. I worked on general construction help, picking up odd jobs and helping where I could.
I also served as the lead for the Sign Team. We created around 130 street signs for the city.
For Burning Man 2017 I worked with a team to build a western themed facade and bar for our Theme Camp. I created a series of Wanted Posters and western themed portraits as decor for the space.
The bar itself was constructed from theatre flats to enable ease of packing and transport. Much of the materials was repurposed from a local Los Angeles company, EcoSet, which gathers materials from film an televisions sets. Other flats we sourced came from an old haunted house that was closing down. I worked with a larger team to create new flats, renovate existing flats, add texture via painting and installing a lighting system within the walls.
My Previous version of the lightsaber worked out well, but after spending some time on the road to an event it broke right away. So I took advantage of needing to fix them to do some major upgrades.
The light sabers are built to the correct sword size for combat. But because of this the plastic handles I previously used were not heavy enough to counterbalance the blade. This time around we ordered custom handles from the Custom Saber Shop. The metal is gorgeous and helps add the needed weight to counter balance.
The electronics for the original saber were too wide to fit inside the new handles so I also swapped over to a Adafruit trinket and a fancy new lithium battery.
Bequinox is a Los Angeles Burning Man regional event which is held in Joshua Tree yearly. This year I was part of the build team who created the effigy we burned as a community.
I worked on the project for several build weekends helping with many different areas of construction. The effigy was designed by Eric Anderson and built by an amazing team of artists. It was an honor to be part of the project and I had a blast building.
Effigy Lit up at Night
Particpants were encouraged to write on wooded leaves and hang them in the tree.
Friday night during the event we all gathered together and burned the effigy.
After hearing about a lightsaber battle event coming up in Los Angeles I decided I wanted to create my own lightsaber. On previous projects I've worked with programmable LED's and wanted a lightsaber I could control the colors on. Below are some process photos from the project.
In my design career, I have observed an “Us vs Them” mentality between designers and engineers. I feel fortunate that my experience has been different, but for many people that is not the case. I view the software engineers that I work with as my partners in design, and developing an effective working relationship with them has made my job easier. I would like to share some of the tips, and design processes that have helped me improve my working relationships with engineers.
Read more at Medium.com
Here are some process photos from the LED shoes I created based on Adafruit's NeoPixel Firewalker tutorial.
The shoes have a velostat pressure sensor in the heel which triggers the LED's to animate when I walk. The LED's are powered by the arduino Gemma based on whatever code I've uploaded to the board.
I am grateful to have had the opportunity to join a crew building an art installation for Burning Man 2014. Inspireality Palace is a large interactive installation designed by two Los Angeles-based artists assisted by a large crew of people from all around the United States. I have always loved installations, but living in the city in a small apartment doesn’t give me many chances to create large work. I joined the project in the spring of 2014 and volunteered my time through the summer.
Every weekend offered up a new challenge and new skills to learn. We started off working on the project in the artists’ backyard. Prior to this project I did not have any experience with power tools or construction work. With a lot of help from others I quickly started using nail guns, table saws and grinders, and learned how to create jigs for cutting wood pieces. I was particularly interested in learning more about electronics and LED’s. The artist in charge of the electronics gave me an introduction and soon I was helping him prep the lights and projectors for the project. This has been a catalyst for me to explore working on my own with LED’s and programming wearable tech such as the Arduino Flora. As the project went on I was able to use my newly acquired construction skills to teach other volunteers and using table saws and grinders like a pro!
Around June the project outgrew the backyard and we moved to a worksite in the desert. Because of its large scale we needed a lot of volunteers, especially volunteers who knew how to weld and work with metal. We had 26 metal arches (some of which were over 26 feet tall) that needed to be cut, welded, finished and painted. They were so large that a team of at least eight people was needed to lift them and move them around the work site. The artists had an expert teach a welding workshop and many of the volunteers, myself included, learned welding for the first time. I spent a lot of time finishing the welded pieces with grinders and managing all of the individual metal parts so the welding crew could work faster. As our end-of-August deadline approached we worked long weekends to finish the project. A week before the event the project was packed up into a few trucks and driven with the crew to the desert outside Reno, Nevada.
Building in the desert provides its own unique set of challenges. It’s hot, dusty, windy and dry in one of the most inhospitable areas imaginable. It’s very easy to get dehydrated and tired in the hot sun. We would often attempt to sleep during the heat of the day and work late into the night. In addition to the environmental challenges, there were challenges with equipment; these problems are harder to solve in a place where you don’t have a hardware store around the corner. As a crew we worked together to find solutions to the various problems that cropped up. The weather was harsh this year and a rain and thunderstorm delayed many of the projects early on. There was an additional rain storm that shut the city down for 24 hours; reports came out of one person getting hit by lightning, and many people were turned around at the front entrance and sent back to Reno.
Despite struggling with the weather, harsh climate and strained resources, Burning Man opened back up and the project was finished. Modifications were made from the original plans but it still turned out impressive. By far the biggest reward of this project was seeing the impact installation had on others. Biking up to it in the early morning and seeing the sunrise glint off the black tiles was breathtaking. It has been delightful hearing other people’s stories of their time inside the art installation, and I’m so happy others have enjoyed it as much as I enjoyed building it. Here is a first time burner’s story of his time with Inspireality Palace. I left the project happy to have found such an amazing crew of people, excited to continue to learn more and inspired to create my own art installation in the future.
Here are some progress photos of a few of the wearable tech projects I've created in the last year.
