In case you missed it, our own Michael Curry gave a great interview to Engadget this weekend. Find out why we decided to make a Robot Petting Zoo, and what we plan to do with it now.

The photo booth was a big hit this year at Maker Faire Bay Area. After visiting the Robot Petting Zoo, we gave everyone the chance to take a few shots with one of the robots or express themselves with monster gloves and googly-eye headbands. See the full set in the slideshow below, or find them here on Flickr!

Any brick?!

This last weekend I had the good fortune to be able to help out with the MakerBot booth at the 2012 Maker Faire Bay Area in San Mateo. ¹  So many people had so many interesting questions that I’d like to just can’t help sharing a few of them here on the blog.

One of my favorite series of questions came from two boys who were at the booth with their father.  After watching half a squirrel being printed out, they asked what material the MakerBot was using to make objects.  I explained that it was the same ABS that went into Legos.  All of a sudden the pairs of eyes that were watching the Replicator were now on me with laser focus.  They had to know if the robot could make Legos.  I told them that people had, indeed, shared designs for Lego compatible bricks on Thingiverse and they were no longer constrained to only have those bricks they could find in stores – they could have any brick they could design.  Now, that got their attention.

Their father, ever the savvy and wary consumer, wanted to know just how expensive it would be to make those bricks.  I responded with my own question – how many plastic building pieces could they buy for $50?  The father and both kids agreed that it wasn’t much – $50.00 might buy you a medium sized Lego set.  I reminded them that those boxes were also mostly empty – you buy a lot of air when you buy a box of Legos. ²  Hefting a spool of ABS plastic in their direction I told them that $50.00 would buy enough plastic to make more than two pounds of bricks – bricks of any size and shape they could imagine.  That definitely got the dad’s attention.

Untitled by jag

This thing brought to you by

1. Near San Francisco [↩]
2. Don’t get me wrong.  I love Legos and own a LOT of them. [↩]

Well, it’s Monday morning after Maker Faire Bay Area and I’m already wishing the festivities could go on a bit longer. There’s just so much to learn and see, and so many makers to meet in such a short amount of time. We brought a ton of Awesome to this year’s faire including a MakerBot BotFarm, as well as a Robot Petting Zoo, a Photo Booth and Awesome Toss’Em (a MakerBot carnival game). In this special Maker Faire edition of MakerBot TV, R.Maker takes you on a tour of the faire and then we chat with a few of the many MakerBot Operators we ran into over the weekend. Thank you so much to everyone who joined in the fun! Keep it awesome!

Thank you to all the fascinating MakerBot Operators who stopped by our booth at Maker Faire this weekend, especially those who were able to make it into our Family Portrait!

MakerBot Family Portrait: Maker Faire Bay Area 2012

Maker Faire Bay Area 2012 has been an incredible event, not just for the 100,000 or so people who came through here — still waiting for the official figures! — but also for the Makers. It’s been a weekend full of weirdness, magic, and…drama!

Here’s the scene: a middle school boy goes to a fantastic summer day camp, Galileo Learning, in Hillsborough, CA. He builds a great go-kart as his final project. But when Galileo transports the go-kart to Maker Faire, the steering wheel is dangling by a single bolt. Missing a nut!

The boy in our story, Adam, is a maker. He saw this problem and went out to fix it. When you’re at Maker Faire, you can probably find someone with the right size nut, right? Surely Tech Shop has one on hand.

Nope! Adam walked around the floor looking for a solution, and then… OH YEAH!

You can make the things you need! Over at the Tinkercad booth, Adam discovered that company’s incredible web-based design platform, and worked with the brilliant Henrik to draw out the right part. And since Tinkercad had a MakerBot right there on the table, he was able to make it on site in a matter of minutes. Shino writes over at the Tinkercad blog that the whole process took 45 minutes, beginning to end. Whoa.

Adam watches as The Replicator makes a part for his go-kart

Installing the nut, designed on Tinkercad

Thanks to the cooperation of friendly people in the Faire, Adam was able to slap the new part onto his go-kart and show his finished product how it was meant to be seen. As soon as we heard the story, we zoomed over to find him and decked him out with a MakerBot t-shirt and Awesome Award.

This is one rad kid, and I was so happy to hear his story, and he was happy to talk about it. Any teachers or parents out there wondering if kids really understand the power of being able to make things for themselves on a MakerBot, here’s a great example to remember.

Thanks for making our Maker Faire, Adam! And thank you to our great friends at Tinkercad for empowering kids the way they do.

Step right up!

The MakerBot booth at Maker Faire Bay Area 2012 is taking shape. For all the updates on where we are and what we’re doing, watch our twitter @makerbot. There will be lots of reasons to keep an eye on us tomorrow, if you catch my drift (…prizes!).

If you are headed down to the San Mateo Event Center, I’ve doctored some maps to help you find us.

We’ve already gotten some visits from other Makers who are setting up today, including the MakerBot superfan Schuyler St. Leger.

Maker Schuyler St. Leger gets an early look at the Bot Farm

Banners are being unrolled:

And the dance floor is installed:

We’re almost ready to roll. Come join us!

It’s going to be a big weekend for everyone attending Maker Faire Bay Area. Here are a few quick ideas for what you could make to be fully prepared for the festivities.

Card holder by eM5

Business Card Holder with Top by eM5

I saw one of these on Annelise’s desk the other day, and I have to have one. If you get a card from me at MakerFaire, it’ll be from one of these suckers!

But here’s why you should have one for MakerFaire. Trading cards! Shawn  Wallace at Make Magazine has designed these awesome 3D printer trading cards for this weekend. There’s no word on whether there will be actual cards – looks like these are just designs right now – but in case some enterprising person turns these into cards, you’ll be prepared with your card holder!

Mustache and Monocle by chefmaki

Disguise!

Are you supposed to come into the office on Saturday, but you’re planning to sneak over to Maker Faire instead? You need this Mustache and Monocle by chefmaki, just in case your boss shows up. Also, if I see you walking around Maker Faire with this thing, I will feature you on the blog, no questions asked.

Whistle by madkite

A Whistle, either this one by Zaggo, or this slightly modified one above by madkite. If you’re bringing your kids to Maker Faire, and if they have a tendency to run off, you can use your whistle to get their attention. Or perhaps you can use it to referee some robot basketball. These are just ideas; a whistle is always useful.

Nepenthesis by Ecken

A beautiful Nepentheses Planter by Ecken. One thing I want to do at Maker Faire if I get the chance is visit some of the gardening booths. I like the idea of making these Guerilla Garden bombs full of wildflower seeds and throwing them around my neighborhood. Maybe you could leave the planter at home, but it would be a great home for some of the flora you might pick up over the weekend.

Trebuchet by jam4ar

Trebuchet

When does one need a reason to make a trebuchet? Make this and launch things; at Maker Faire. Case closed. Here’s one from jam4ar.

If you are a mover, a shaker, and a Maker, let us stamp your passport! We’ll have our passport stamps at Maker Faire this weekend, including a special edition Robot Petting Zoo stamp. If you don’t have your passport yet, you can grab one from Adafruit. Collect stamps, prove your cred.

It’s about to get really Maker Faire-ish on this blog! The MakerBot team is gearing up for our trip to San Mateo this week, where we will be throwing down some awesome with Makers from around the globe. Whoa-I-can’t-wait-why-isn’t-it-Saturday-yet?

If you’re going to be a part of Maker Faire this weekend, please stop by and say hello to us. But be prepared for MakerBot staff to be super interested in you and what you like to make.

Lots more info to come, but here are our Top Five Makers this year that we can’t wait to visit. Notice: this list is subject to change before the day’s out.

Cory Soto’s Dalek — building a “Dalek Mutant Vehicle…on a Yamaha G9 gas engine”. He’s been documenting his progress here.

Christian Ristow’s Face Forward — oh come on you have to be kidding me! A 12-foot tall robotic human face controlled by a bunch of joysticks. “Members of the public may operate the levers and play their part in the orchestration of an ongoing “river” of facial expressions.”

Wearable Computing Fashion Show by Lynne Bruning – “A fashion show that features wearable computing, soft-circuits and eTextiles from multiple designers, innovators and makers.” What more can I say?

Andrew Kaye’s 8x8x8 LED Cube — MORE LEDs!!!!! Filling a giant box with 512 LEDs is one of the best things one person can do for another person. Awesome.

Evil Mad Scientist’s High Tech Pumpkins – electronic, robotic pumpkins this Halloween. This is the world we want to live in. Evil Mad Scientist is going to show us how.