Tinker.it and Bluetooth Arduino

Arduino Bluetooth
Arduino Bluetooth

Arduino Bluetooth released
I have just received my Arduino Bluetooth board (shown top), available for 79 euros (+vat & delivery) from here. It is extremely easy to get going, just connect to the bluetooth device from your machine and it mounts it as a serial port, ready to read sensors and control actuators. I’ll post experiments in this later.

The device has a great set of features, using the Bluegiga WT11 Bluetooth means it can work up to 100m away, you can send commands to other Arduino BT to create a network, scan for nearby Bluetooth devices etc. The board uses a ATmega168 (so twice the program memory space than previous Arduino), has three more PWM pins, two more analog inputs can run on smaller 3v batteries.

Arduino Bluetooth Workshop
The excellent Mediamatic in Amsterdam is having an Arduino Unplugged Workshop on 12th-14th March. For 125 euros, Massimo Banzi (aka Mr.Arduino) will give you layout details of the Arduino Bluetooth board, you’ll learn how to connect which hardware to it, and you’ll learn the basic programming skills needed for building your own Arduino application. All participants design and build their own wireless Arduino project. Having attended an Arduino workshop over a year ago, I can highly recommend it to any beginners interested in the area of physical computing.

Tinker.it launched
By the looks of his blog and photos, Massimo has been super busy with others starting up the tinker.it company. Tinker.it are a company that provide products, services, workshops and consultancy to the design/art/architecture community. For more on their services and recent projects, visit www.tinker.it

Tinker It

Some of their products in the works that are very interesting to me…

I’ve already mentioned the Arduino Bluetooth, but look out for the Arduino Ethernet, using Open Sound Control over a network interface. There is an Interactive MP3 Player that you can control using sensors and Arduino code. A DMX Interface for controlling lighting projects. Also a modular LED matrix prototyping tool and Tastiera, a USB keyboard emulator (for fast protyping using digital on/off inputs). Potentially a great set of products for artists.

Tinker It Toolkit

Tinker.it are also producing a Prototyping Toolkit, a complete system designed to allow designers to rapidly prototype interactive devices and evaluate sensors and actuators. These are prebuilt sensors and actuators, each with their own mini circuit board, so can be plugged straight in, Reminiscent of the pre-made sensors for i-cube and teabox. Perfect for designers who aren’t yet ready to get their hands mucky with solder.

Posted on February 5th 2007 under Physical Computing