Collaborate Disseminate
The videos from [styropyro] are always amusing and informative. However, ironically for him, he is alarmed that many green laser pointers are more powerful than they are supposed to be. …read more Continue reading The World’s Brightest Laser Pointer?
Suppose you were looking for all the essential elements to make a great Halloween-themed shooting game. Zombies? Check. Giant “lasers”? Check. Crossbows shooting forks? We’ve got you covered. Check out …read more Continue reading Halloween Game Lets You Shoot Zombies With a Laser-Powered Crossbow
Video games are great and all, but sometimes you just want the thrill of manipulating actual objects in addition to watching action on a screen. This must have been the …read more Continue reading Laser Pointer and Arduino Make a Minimalistic Shooting Game
The team that hacked Amazon Echo and other smart speakers using a laser pointer continue to investigate why MEMS microphones respond to sound. Continue reading Laser-Based Hacking from Afar Goes Beyond Amazon Alexa
An interferometer sounds like something complicated, and in a way, it is. But it is also pretty easy to build one with some common materials. [Let’s Innovate] has instructions for how to make an interferometer using a green laser pointer, some mirrors, and a CD case. one of the most …read more
As a society, we’ve largely come together to agree that laser pointers are mostly useless. They’re now the preserve of university lecturers and those destined to wind up in a jail cell for harassing helicopter pilots. Most pointers are of the diode-pumped solid state variety. However, [Zenodilodon] treads a different …read more
Laser pointers were cool for about 30 seconds when they first came out, before becoming immediately passé and doing absolutely nothing to improve the boss’s quarterly reports presentation. However, just as with boom boxes and sports cars, more power can always make things better. [Styropyro] was unimpressed with the weak and unreliable laser pointers he’d sourced from eBay, so gutted one and began a fresh build.
After fiddling with some basic 1mW eBay green lasers, [styropyro] had some fun turning up the wick by fiddling with the internal trimpots. This led to the quick and untimely death of the cheap …read more
Continue reading Building A 1.4W Laser Pointer In A Tiny Housing
This may come as a shock, but some of those hot screaming deals on China-sourced gadgets and goodies are not all they appear. After you plunk down your pittance and wait a few weeks for the package to arrive, you just might find that you didn’t get exactly what you thought you ordered. Or worse, you may get a product with unwanted bugs features, like some green lasers that also emit strongly in the infrared wavelengths.
Sure, getting a free death ray in addition to your green laser sounds like a bargain, but as [Brainiac75] points out, it actually represents …read more
Continue reading Science Shows Green Lasers Might Be More Than You Bargained For
Who would have thought you could make a game out of an optical bench? [Chris Mitchell] did, and while we were skeptical at first, his laser Light Bender game has some potential. Just watch your eyes.
The premise is simple: direct the beam of a colored laser to the correct target before time runs out. [Chris] used laser-cut acrylic for his playfield, which has nine square cutouts arranged in a grid. Red, green, and blue laser pointers line the bottom of the grid, with photosensors and RGB LEDs lining the grid on the other three sides. Play starts with a …read more
Continue reading Lasers, Mirrors, and Sensors Combine in an Optical Bench Game
Designing a unique clock to flex your technical skills can be a rewarding experience and result in an admirable showpiece for your home. [Andres Robam] saw an opportunity to make a laser-pointer clock that draws the current time onto a glow-in-the-dark sticker.
A pair of stepper motors tilt and pan the laser’s mount — designed in SolidWorks and 3D printed. There was an issue with the motor’s shaft having some slack in it — enough to affect the accuracy of the laser. [Andres] cleverly solved the issue by using a pen’s spring to generate enough tension in the system, correcting …read more
Continue reading Laser Pointer Clock Makes Timekeeping A Drawn-Out Affair