Sentinel

Yesterday I stumbled to the good old music from Sentinel, a computer game we used to play a lot with Amiga when kids. The eerie music (here in Youtube) and the constant panicky feeling when playing the game were rather captivating. It's a game I'd still gladly play today. Anyway, after checking a couple of shots from the game boards I decided to give a try and build a small 3D paper model of the Sentinel itself. It took me a while to figure out how to make the hat, etc., but it didturn out to be quite ok in the end (except that it looks a bit like a duck if you watch it from top).

It is disturbing, though, to sit here my back turned to the thing. A part of me is waiting to hear that turning sound... Maybe one day I'll build a lamp or an alarm clock or a burglar detector out of it. (It would be a great outfit in a party, too.) Would scare the hell out of me, anyway, to add a motion sensor and make it turn. Hmm, I definitely see some stop motion possibilities here...

Gravity Pinball

I'm still writing my final thesis and still creating some concepts for interactive astronomy stuff. Today I tested an idea I've had for some time, just to see if it would work. I've been wanting to include some kind of a pinball machine that would use small gravity fields to guide the ball. I build a very crude version this morning out of plastic wrap and push pins, but it actually worked surprisingly well when I rolled small wooden pearls along the wrap. Einstein's theory of relativity, anyone?