Saturday, November 14, 2009

The Fauxtar

The Fauxtar:

It's a controller for Frets on Fire an open source version of Guitar Hero. Katie and I have gotten kind of addicted to it, so I decided to make a real controller for it. It's made from a lot of scrap pine, some pieces of steel and aluminum that I had lying around, and the control PCB from an old PS/2 keyboard. The game requires the F1, F2, F3, F4, F5, right Shift, and Return keys, so I mapped out the F-keys on the neck, and the right Shift and Return (alt pick and pick, respectively) to two switches in the body. I'm working on the second generation of buttons, made from the same lighted membrane switches as those on the Monome.

Monday, November 02, 2009

Good Weekend!

Well, that was a good weekend! Katie and I recently discovered Frets on Fire, an open-source alternative to guitar hero, so I decided to make a guitar-shaped controller for it. I'm now half done, so here's a picture of Katie's Axe in its current condition:

Also, on a visit to Finger Lakes ReUse yesterday, we found an iRobot Roomba 400 for $20!

All in all, a pretty good weekend. More on the Axe, and what we do with the Roomba as events warrant.