Todd Blatt

Interview with a robot maker at Play-i

2013-05-14T13:06:00.000-04:00

I came out here to San Francisco for an 11 day trip, and am staying with my friend Jenny Lin. She works at a company called Play-i, which is making robots for kids to play with while they also learn programming by interacting with them. Play-i was founded last year by Vikas Gupta, the man behind Jambool, a platform that allowed developers to incorporate payment systems for virtual goods into their games. Jambool sold to Google for about $70 million back in 2010. He then went on to work for Google as Head of Consumer Payments. He's teamed up with some pretty smart engineers, and my friend Jenny who I know is an awesome programmer to bring us (they say 5-8 year-olds but I know I'll probably get one) cool ~$100 programmable robots. I must have heard the term "tangible interaction" 50 times so far since visiting Play-i.

There are about 7 people working there with Vikas, including the former VP of Engineering at Frog Design, the former leader of the iPod software team from Apple, and the former Marketing Lead at Symantec.

Today Play-i announced via this AllThingsD.com article that they closed a $1 million round of seed funding, led by Madrona Venture Group and Google Ventures. I got a chance to visit the Play-i offices in Sunnyvale and check out their prototypes and see what they were working on. Here's a short video interview with Vikas:

Hopefully products like Play-i's forthcoming robots will help breed a new generation of makers. You can follow Play-i on twitter for more updates.

Noisebridge visit

2013-05-10T23:36:00.005-04:00

I'm at the Noisebridge hackerspace here in the Mission District of San Francisco. The culture here is very different than NY or Baltimore. The hackerspace is open 24/7, and anyone can buzz in anyone else. It's very open and inviting, but people seem a bit more loopy, and there are not the typical hacker type people around. It's hard to describe. I'll let it marinate and explain more after I spend more time here.

I spent a few hours today assembling these cool new necklaces which I'll be selling at Maker Faire next weekend. They're supposed to be T Virus style zombie DNA. I couldn't find any blue food coloring but I'll check some other stores tomorrow. The DNA parts were 3d printed by Shapeways in NY, and I've just dropped them in little glass vials. They are kind of a pain to assemble because of surface tension of the water, the need to insert the rubber corks and glue on the tops. The part's don't cost so much so maybe it's worth it. I'll find out next weekend and see if people buy them.

I also got a chance to check out the Shapeways G+ Hangout with Duann and one of the other shapeways employees who I met last week but his name escapes me. The interactive online hangout was attended by 15 people overall and was broadcast live from the Long Island City factory in Queens. Without being too specific, they gave some hints as to what is to come, more materials and more machines. A bunch of questions were asked by a fellow named Vlad in Russia, who was asking his questions to set up a competing service to Shapeways in Russia, since UPS isn't delivering there. It was slightly awkward to watch Duann answer his questions knowing full well he was helping a competitor, but he was helpful nonetheless.

I pressed Duann a little bit on the 3d printing of The Liberator 3d printed gun parts, since I assume now Shapeways will need to check each print submitted to make sure it's not a gun. It's interesting to compare this to the DMCA safe harbor/intellectual property discussion because the whole argument there is that the hosting service can't possibly check everything uploaded because there are too many. The typical example is that no one sits and checks each YouTube video that gets uploaded to see if it's infringing on someone else's work because that wouldn't be possible. Duann said it'll probably not be a big deal, the tray planners, sorters and shippers know what the parts look like, and it's all just media hype, which I tend to agree with. I did enjoy the part of the hangout where he set some prints on fire.

Inside 3d Printing Expo Interview

2013-05-07T11:34:00.003-04:00

I'm getting ready to leave for my west coast trip tomorrow. I'll be mostly in San Francisco, and maybe a little Vancouver. I'm super excited for Bay Area Maker Faire, where I'll be sure to take lots of photos to post. In the mean time, here's a video of an interview I did at the Inside 3D Printing Expo in NYC.

The More You Node: 3D Printing

2013-04-18T16:21:00.001-04:00

The More You Node is a learning series presented by members at the Baltimore Node Hackerspace, where I've been a member for a few years now. Come out next week on Thursday night during open hack to learn about 3d printing. I'll be doing a demo, explaining CAD design, and show you how to use a 3d printer to turn your design into reality.

In addition to teaching how to use the 3d printer, give a bunch of background information on 3d printing, and I'll field as many questions as possible during the night.

Check out the Baltimore Node blog post on the event for more information

Road to MakerFaire

2013-04-12T14:23:00.000-04:00

I'm headed to California for Maker Faire, and I'll actually be out there for about a week and a half prior to the event at San Mateo. I'll be flying with the tickle-me-elmo in carbonite, plus a bunch of 3d printed objects to display at my booth. I've entered a competition called Road to Maker Faire, and they're allowing anyone to vote on the coolest projects. You can vote on as many as you'd like, and also you can ote once a day until April 15th. If you like mine, make sure you vote on it here!

If you voted (or even if you didn't) you can head over to Thingiverse to download a 3d printable version of Tickle-me-Elmo in Carbonite!

Disney shuts down LucasArts

2013-04-03T16:50:00.000-04:00

LucasArts made so many amazing games that I grew up on, and created so many amazing moments in my life and in millions of others. They brought you into the star wars universe, and many others, and made them interactive. It's because of Star Wars Jedi Knight: Dark Forces II that I got into 3d modeling, and why I am doing 3d printing today.

I understand that there will still be Star Wars games, and many great ones. However just knowing that the studio that produced the ones I loved as a kid is closing up shop saddens me quite a bit.

I loved the Star Wars games. Just a few of the ones I had were, Rebel Assault 1&2, Dark Forces 1&2, X-wing which I got on 5 floppies for free when my parents bought a new sound card for the 386 computer, and the floppy disk B-wing expansion game for it, Tie Fighter, X-wing vs Tie fighter, Rebellion, and so many more. There were also a slew of non-Star Wars games I loved, mainly the point-and-click adventure games. The Monkey Island series was one of my favorites. Humor, adventure, and puzzles. I loved Sam and Max, and especially Full Throttle. I've chosen to recreate the head of the main character, Manny Calavera, the main character which you control in LucasArts's 1998 release of Grim Fandango. He's a "dualstrustion" print, using both black and white filament, printed on my 3d printer. You can download the files here on Thingiverse.

LucasArts is such a cornerstone of the gaming experience in general and Star Wars universe to me that it is sad to see this chapter closing as a result of the sale to Disney.

The Finest Purple Sandtrooper Armor Around

2013-03-20T11:16:00.001-04:00

I was at Lunacon the Sci-Fi and fantasy convention in Rye Brook this weekend, peddling my 3d printed wares from www.custom3dstuff.com and I ran into a few members of the Empire City Garrison of the 501st Legion. I picked picked out Rachel to do a 3d scan of her in her sandtrooper armor. I cleaned up the scan in MeshMixer and used my 3d printer to print her out. She had her bucket off, and I did a body scan, and then 3d printed her from the waist up, Here's TD-5531 at 1:8 scale in the finest set of purple armor around

3d scanning people at Farpoint

2013-02-22T12:59:00.001-05:00

I spent the last week in Baltimore city and its suburbs, and a few of the days I was at the Farpoint Science Fiction Convention in Timonium, MD. With me, I brought my 3d printer, my new 3d scanner, Tickle-me-Elmo in Carbonite, and a bunch of Custom 3d Stuff jewelry to sell.

In attendance to the con was Felicia Day who plays Codex in The Guild and Penny in Dr. Horrible's Sing-a-long Blog. She was more than thrilled to learn I could make a miniature of her head, so she had me 3d scan and 3d print her. Here's the video she tweeted to her 2+ million followers.

My head is being 3D printed at a booth! vine.co/v/brEduTznvv6
— Felicia Day (@feliciaday) February 17, 2013

Giancarlo Esposito who plays Gus in Breaking Bad and from Once Upon a Time, as well as actor Lee Arenberg from Pirate of the Caribbean and also from Once Upon a time, were both willing to get 3d scanned and 3d printed too. These two guys were very cool as well, and they also said that they'd allow me to post the digital files of their busts online so that other fans could download and print them out too on their own printers.

Lee was telling me how he's been scanned before for films and thought it was neat that I had the equipment right there to do it. He was very happy with the results and was happy to leave with a 3d printed bust of himself. If you'd like to download a copy of either of these two guys for yourself, go ahead and click for the Giancarlo Esposito and Lee Arenberg's scans.

I also scanned several other people that weekend, including some of my friends at the nearby Maryland States Foosball Championship. Here's scans of Chris and Jen who I play foosball with.

Jen's hair came out looking amazing. So did Chris's, but mo-hawks always look amazing.

Finally, I was able to scan and print a blind woman named Courtney. She explained to me that it was difficult for her to know what she looked like because of the feedback she was getting from her own face when she touched it. She said this different from touching anyone else's face like she normally does to be able to tell what other people look like. Through the use of 3d scanning and 3d printing, Courtney was able to see what she looked like for the very first time.

You can download Giancarlo Esposito, Lee Arenburg, Courney, Jen and Chris from my account on Thingiverse, user name zenix and please also check out my site www.Custom3dStuff.com and enjoy!

Tickle-Me-Elmo in Carbonite

2013-02-19T13:07:00.000-05:00

I was at my hackerspace one evening and we got to talking about crazy ideas, like normal. We have a full size Han Solo in Carbonite at the space, and someone mentioned that it'd be funny to encase old toys in a smaller carbonite box. So I did. I used the ShopBot CNC router at the MIT FablLab at CCBC in Catonsville, MD to cut the box, an arduino to copy code to an attiny85 to run the randomization script for the LED lights, and my MakerBot to 3d print the side panels I'd previously designed for a different project. The side panels are posted here on Thingiverse and I just drilled out holes for the lights.

Check out the video... He still giggles, wiggles, and tickles!

If you'd like, please donate on the right to the kEFF :) (Keep Elmo Frozen Foundation) and check out my site, www.custom3dstuff.com

Scout Trooper Blaster

2013-01-21T10:10:00.002-05:00

About two weeks ago, Thingiverse user astaines downloaded this 3d Warehouse blaster, modified it to be printable, removed the trigger, and uploaded it to Thingiverse. This bothered me for a few reasons. First off, the model originally designed and uploaded to 3d Warehouse wasn't too accurate to the screen used prop. It wasn't designed for 3d printing, and isn't very smooth either. It had to be glued together, and you couldn't see through the scope. Nonetheless, this blaster got lots of attention from The Replica Prop Forum and the 501st Legion. Lucasfilm/Disney copyright issues aside, it bugged me that the 3d Warehouse model was uploaded under a free and nonrestrictive licence, yet the Thingiverse one was under a noncommercial license. I felt I could do a better job slicing it up for 3d printing, make it smooth and accurate, be able to be assembled with no glue, and I wanted to put it up under a less restrictive licence.

On Wednesday I used a few reference pictures of the original screen used prop, and started sculpting the blaster from scratch in AutoCAD. Friday I brought the files and my MakerBot into MarsCon where I had an artist's table set up. The rules of the sci-fi convention specifically stated that you couldn't bring in realistic-looking weapons, so I didn't. I made it there. The print takes about 6 hours at 120mm/s using the new 7.0 firmware at .2mm layer height. It's very fun to take apart and play with.

I actually printed two blasters over the weekend and sold one to one of the Scout Troopers from the Tyranus Garrion. The files for this project are uploaded here, and be sure to check out my company Custom 3d Stuff

Click here for more pictures

Hutzler Hacking

2012-12-22T11:06:00.001-05:00

I was so frustrated this morning when preparing my cereal. I could not slice my left handed banana with my right handed Hutzler 571 Banana Slicer.

One of the best features that digital files have over physical objects is the ability to mirror them! With the magic of 3d printing, now we won't have to suffer from having mismatched slicers and bananas anymore. You can download both versions of my improved banana slicer here on Thingiverse, or just buy it from amazon if you're one of the few people who still don't have a 3d printer at their house yet.

Moving on

2012-12-19T16:00:00.002-05:00

I'm no longer working at MakerBot and am focusing my efforts on the applications of 3d printing and digital fabrication. I'm working with Custom 3D Stuff, LLC to make awesome designs, jewelry, and engineering prototypes, among many other things. For this week and next, you'll find me frequenting the 3DEA 3d printing popup store in Manhattan at 29th St and 6th Ave. It's a pretty neat place. See you there!

I'm a Maker, with a business card to prove it

2012-06-23T11:10:00.002-04:00

So mid-March I moved up to Brooklyn, NY. to start work full time as a Maker/3D modeler at MakerBot and it's been pretty awesome. I've worked on tons of projects, and am having a great time. I've been playing a lot of foosball with some friends at Fat Cat and going to a lot of events. The NYC Resistor is nice, but I miss my hackerspace. Lots of my stuff is still there, and there is way more space, or at least it feels that way. The Resistor is crowded most of the time, and I can't go whenever I want since I'm not a member and they're invite only.

I've been bouncing around at a couple short term places but next week I'll be moving to Williamsburg. Now that I have a more permanent place, I'll be bringing a few more of my things up from Baltimore. I still own the house there, and my stuff is all there too. The most exciting thing i'll be bringing is my stormtrooper armor, and I've requested a transfer from the Old Line Garrison to the Empire City Garrison. Being a 501st member is fun.

A Makerbot in every classroom

2012-03-09T16:30:00.002-05:00

Ms Rothstein's Geometry Class chec

I first learned about 3d printing in 1999 on an 11th grade field trip to Northrop Grumman where I got to see it in action. Today, I returned to my high school with a MakerBot 3d printer and showed it to 11th grade engineering students among others. I asked Mrs Rothstein (who was my geometry teacher) and her whole class what they'd like for me to print, and they wanted a heart with BT, the initials of the school on it. We modeled it and printed it out right there. Others who came to see the printer in action included two teachers from the art department, a computer science teacher, lots of random walk-in people from the hallway, and even the principal of the school. It was exciting to hear the conversations from the faculty all talking about how much money they had left over in their budget that they'd be willing to put towards the purchase of a 3d printer. The engineering club was first, and during the club, we designed a thing that looks like a B when looking at it from the front, and a T from the side. The part was printed upside-down because of the way it was shaped, and you can check out the model here: http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:18865

We printed out a few of these, so they might be around the school somewhere. I know Neville Jacobs has at least one of them. We also made a few tokens with initials for two of the students whose initials are ENL and ACL, and for the theater department teacher, whose initials are DS. The cad files used to 3d print the BT Heart and BT symbol are both online and can be found at www.thingiverse.com. They are things number 18865 and 18866 and are available for download, and are ready to be 3d printed by anyone around the world.

I also got the opportunity to talk about the www.baltimorenode.org Baltimore Node Hackerspace and brought a few fliers to give out. Even the principal was interested in the space, and saw a future for 3d printing in the classroom. People from so many departments were interested in the printer, and there are so many uses, from robot parts to props for theater in plays, and for sculpture in art class, just to name a few. It really is exciting times and I wonder what life would be like for me today if I had access to one of these when I was in school. Maybe BT will have one of these in the copy room soon!

CNC cutting at Ponoko

2012-02-28T12:14:00.002-05:00

After being banned from selling things I make at the MIT FabLab at CCBC Catonsville I had to go elsewhere for CNC cutting. The benefit of the FabLab was that I could cut costs since I was doing all of the labor. To make a kit for someone to build the box with the same dimensions as the box used to make the Han Solo in Carboinite prop as seen in The Empire Strikes Back it only cost me my time plus the cost of the wood from Home Depot, or a wood supply place nearby. Since no one is allowed to sell things they create at the FabLab at CCBC (even though the FabLab charter explicitly states we are allowed) I took my plans and sent them to Ponoko. Ponoko is a site that lets you submit designs for stuff, and they'll fabricate it through lasercutting, 3d printing, and CNC routing. They'll also assemble electronics kits through Sparkfun. I prefer the environment created by Shapeways for 3d printing, but since that's all they offer, I went to Ponoko for the large CNC router.

For the Ponoko, I needed to make some adjustments, because they wont ship anything longer than 48 inches. The box is over 7' tall, so I needed to cut the four long pieces in half, and make a puzzlepiece kind of attachment. Also Ponoko forces you to use a on-center cutter path, so there are some tricks to convert that. You're actually drawing the router path, and not the side of the tool or the part you want. Strange things happen, like to make squared outside corners, you must create a .25" radius curved toolpath. What was awesome was that on my first try I was able to get the puzzle piece connectors to fit, and the tab connectors at the corners of the box also fit perfectly. The edges of the pieces are super nice, way nicer than I was achieving on the ShopBot at the FabLab. I think they did multiple passes to get the nice corners. Also, they're using a vacuum table to hold down the wood to the table, so there is no need for the connector tabs commonly used at the FabLab to hold interior shapes to the wood they're being cut from. In the past, these tabs needed to be filed off. The CCBC FabLab has had plans to build this vacuum table but haven't yet been able to get it to work, and also I've been told they've been to busy and haven't had time to work on it. It's been a year already and has been sitting in pieces on top of the Rapidmill which also isn't ever used...

Ponoko also packed and shipped for me for free since I have an premium account with them. The premium account lets things that cost more than $100 ship for free anywhere in the US, and $2.00 in Canada. I think it's free in New Zealand too. In the past, shipping was my hardest part. The ShopBot CNC router at the fablab is pretty easy to use, the longest and hardest part is attaching the wood to the table. Shipping is really what was killing me. It was time consuming to build the big telescoping boxes, and pack them, and a pain to transport them. Ponoko expertly packed the pieces and packed them up for me, making it easy to sell to customers. I can now pay for shipping myself to send them cheaper ways for international orders since the boxes are smaller, and I can drop ship them to customers in the USA, Canada, and New Zealand. Thanks Ponoko!

3D Printing Piracy

2012-01-26T17:00:00.000-05:00

Well this week has been kind of interesting. On Tuesday, The Pirate Bay announced a new section on their site called Physibles. Physibles is the term they decided to use to call their 3d printing/digital things file section. The site mirrors the function of Makerbot's Thingiverse and Google's 3d Warehouse by allowing people to download cad data for their 3d printers. The difference is that The Pirate Bay does not host the files themselves, like Thingiverse does. The way that The Pirate Bay works is by providing links to a file that tells you who else has the file, similar to how Google search doesn't host files, but tells you where on the internet files and websites and things are located. This decentralization allows for information to be spread even if one site is shut down, because the files are hosted in dozens and often even thousands of places around the world. Torrents don't mean illegal file sharing, though many people often think they are the same thing.

Anyway, as soon as I found out about the physibles section, and read the blog post which mentioned that they were going to rename the site The Product Bay temporarily but didn't have a graphic artist on hand, I got the idea to 3d model the pirate ship seen in their logo. After about 3 hours of modeling, and 30 minutes of figuring out how to share my own torrent and list it on their site, my model was being shared around the world. I modeled the ship, three masts, ropes, cannons, stairs, a sliding board, railings, barrels and and even the casette tape and crossbones logo for the center sail. I designed the ship using the design constraints of the White strong and Flexible material from an EOS printer, and listed it for sale in my Shapeways shop. You can buy a 3d print of it for $99, and hang on to a pretty cool physical print of history in the making. It's also listed on Thingiverse here: http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:16419

The coolest thing was that yesterday when all of the news sites started reporting on the new section, they grabbed the screenshot of my 3d model that was now being shared among hundreds of people, and used that photo in their articles. It was the main image on dozens of articles, including Wired and Popular Science. I even got interviewed yesterday by a tech reporter from the New Scientist magazine.

Of course after already receiving the cease and desist letter from Paramount last summer, I'm not going to share my 3d model of the Super 8 cube, but someone else has uploaded a 3d fractal cube to Thingiverse. I wonder how things will be different for others in the future now that there is a section for these types of files on TPB.

Interesting times.

My Keepon

2011-12-22T22:37:00.003-05:00

I got one of these today for just $20, it dances to music, reacts to touch, plays sound, and more! I printed a hat and hands/collar on the MakerBot at the Baltimore Node today. Shapeways is running a contest right now for 3d printed accessories for the My Keepon. I took him apart later on today, just to see what was inside. Apparently, you can connect an arduino to the I2C pins inside and control it from your computer. Learn all you can about My Keepon hacking here: http://www.nonpolynomial.com/2011/11/09/mykeepon-hacking/

The other side of the counter

2011-11-24T22:13:00.001-05:00

It's going to be strange, but tomorrow I'll be selling things on Black Friday, instead of buying things. I'll be in the Load of Fun gallery, which is the first floor of the building in which the Baltimore Node Hackerspace is located. That's where I do most of my design work, and where I pack up my orders. I'll be selling 3D printed jewelry that I designed and had printed via Shapeways.

Here's an article talking about the event:
http://www.baltimorebrew.com/2011/11/23/your-black-friday-alternative-station-north-black-friday-art-market/

In Station North, the arts and entertainment district of Baltimore, north of Penn Station, the last friday of the month is Final Fridays, an event of music and arts. Come on out!
http://www.stationnorth.org/finalfridays

3d printed spinning bow tie

2011-09-26T18:09:00.001-04:00

I had to make a commercial, because these guys are just too awesome.

I did need to slide a razor blade under the front diamond to loosen the spinning part once I got it, but now it spins like (an inception top in) a dream. I'll probably be modifying the models so the razor blade isn't needed.

You can buy any one of the 7 styles for $30 here:
bow ties on shapeways

Maker Faire!

2011-09-17T21:46:00.003-04:00

Maker Faire has been awesome! Thank you all who came out and a special thanks to those of you who purchased prints from me at Maker Faire. I've nearly sold out, and I surely with have nearly nothing left to bring home by the end of today tomorrow. You can order more fromt he links I've got here on the site. People seemed to love the stellated dodecahedron ORDER ONE HERE

and the escher tri cube. ORDER ONE HERE

Both are $15 each and you can order them using the links above and you'll receive them in about two weeks. I'll make more designs like this for the future.

3d Printed Bow Ties!

2011-09-14T02:18:00.002-04:00

And they spin! I modeled these this evening, and am about to place my order, so I'll have one of these next week. I'll post a video when I get it.

I'm the Baltimorax; I speak for the trees!

2011-08-04T02:33:00.000-04:00

We've got a situation going on in Baltimore... They're running the Grand Prix car race in the middle of downtown Baltimore, and are cutting down 40+ year old trees to clear the viewing lines from the stands they're erecting for the 3 day race. They say they're replacing the trees, but they're replacing mature trees with saplings. We're raising awareness and financial support to protest this since they're cutting down the trees illegally, and community activist and tech community member Dave Troy is filing an injunction.

To raise money, I made the Baltimorax keychain/necklace charm and a ring that looks like the stone circle with the word unless on it. I thought it would be a cool thing for people here to have, and you'd also be helping us out.

For those not in the know, the face is the Natty Boh guy... National Bohemian beer is brewed and bottled in the city.

Buy them here:
UNLESS ring
Baltimorax necklace pendant/keychain ring

Please sign the petition:
Trees before Grand Prix

Now Marvel is here too?

2011-07-25T14:36:00.000-04:00

Looks like Marvel's lawyers are crawling on Shapeways now. I saw an advanced screening of Captain America in Whitemarsh, MD on Wednesday last week. Here's a pic of me standing in line.

The next day I made a couple models. This time the studio is upset because of this key chain and lapel pin.

At least one other member besides myself had their models set to private by shapeways so that shapeways could comply to a take down request from Marvel. I received an email today from Shapeways telling me that some of my models were set to private so no one can order them or see them, and that I need to remove them from the site. This is the message that Shapeways received,and forwarded to the users who created the models listed:

Re: NOTICE AND TAKE DOWN – http://www.shapeways.com/

Dear Shapeways Legal Support:

Marvel Entertainment, LLC ("Marvel") is a character-based entertainment company with a proprietary library of over 8,000 characters. Marvel owns or controls the copyrights, trademarks, and other intellectual property rights in and to the following publications and characters featured in such publications: Captain America, Hydra, Iron Man, and Spider-Man, among others.

It has come to our attention that merchants on your site are advertising, soliciting, and selling unauthorized merchandise themed after Marvel's properties. Please see the following links:

[model link removed]
[model link removed]
[model link removed]
[model link removed]
[model link removed]
[model link removed]

Please direct all correspondence to:

Gregory Pan, Legal Affairs
Marvel Entertainment, LLC
135 W. 50th Street, 7th Floor
New York, NY 10020
Phone: (212) 576-4000 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting (212) 576-4000 end_of_the_skype_highlighting ext. 8619
Fax: (212) 572-576-8569
gpan@marvel.com

I have a good faith belief that use of the copyrighted material described above on the allegedly infringing web pages and the linked pages on these pages is not authorized by Marvel, its agent or the law.

I swear, under penalty of perjury, that the information in the notification is accurate and that I am the copyright owner or am authorized to act on behalf of the owner of an exclusive right that is allegedly infringed.

Please act expeditiously to remove the material identified and contact me at (212) 576-4000 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting (212) 576-4000 end_of_the_skype_highlighting ext. 8619, or gpan@marvel.com if you have any questions. Marvel reserves the right to take all available remedies available at law and in equity to protect its interests, and nothing in this letter shall be construed as a waiver or relinquishment of any rights or remedies available to it.

Sincerely,

Gregory Pan

No Endorsement Badge

2011-07-03T00:05:00.000-04:00

In response to Cory Doctorow's recent boingboing post, I've made this image which people are free to use when they make files available online without getting approval or endorsement from the original artist but still want to pay them for their work. It's an alternative to copyright, and an alternative to the Creator-Endorsed mark. This is my version of the No Endorsement badge:

The first product I've placed it on is a little necklace charm/action figured inspired by the design of the little character on the cover of Cory Doctorow's first novel, Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom.
You can buy it now on Shapeways, and you'll have it delivered to your house in about 10 days. Here is the link to Plug Dude.

Cease and Desist

2011-06-27T00:23:00.000-04:00

So, I like to make things, and I made a cube similar to the one seen in Paramount Pictures's Super 8. This got me into trouble.

A rendering produced by Shapeways from the CAD file I designed.

I designed the 3D cad file, uploaded it to Shapeways, ordered one, and promptly (18 hours later) got a Cease and Desist email letter from Paramount's lawyers telling me to take down the file. I didn't want to fight in court, so I complied and am not selling, and have not sold, nor will I in the future be selling any Super 8 replicas. I took down the CAD file so no one can order it. It's purely just a fan creation and only one exists, which I ordered for myself before receiving the C&D letter. There is a company called Quantum Mechanix (QMx) which will be selling licensed replicas soon, and if you're a fan you should order one from them.

Below is a video of a vibrating box made from my CAD file, which is not for sale.

Again, this is not for sale, please don't ask.