I'll say right now where my machine expertise lies: old, beated down, barely working things that I can fix or at least mutate into some other whirling, spinning thing. Bicycles, covered in grease, hacked apart and put back together. Old Volkswagens. Unidentifiable hunks of wires and gears. Ethereal computer magic-box art making? Not so much.

When it comes to 2D art, I seldom work in the computer. If at all, I work only in photoshop, which i am rather good at. But never illustrator.

So when I had this idea of using rapid prototyping machines to make MY machine, I was simultaneously excited and dreading the point where i would have to be working on the computer. Im a ink flinger, a grease monkey, a wrench head- not a mouse jockey. Or a tablet jockey, in this case.

(image: the completed cam follower, with the cam. They rust like this about 5 seconds out of the waterjet)

More behind the jump- go on, read it. Everyone is doing it.

I was commissioned this year by the Burning Man project to create a very special project: a beating, kinetic, heart for none other than The Man. Being on the build team for Mr. Splinters (El Hombre del Fuego, Dude Man, The Great False Idol) I was honored and wanted to create something very, very special. I'll be chronicling the build of the heart over the next few days.

After much debate, I settled on a design from KMODDL, a wonderful, smooth, cam-and-follower mecanism that reminded me of the beating heart of some giant.  Since KMODDL provides CAD drawings, I could easily take some of the parts into Adobe Illustrator to elaborate on and, you know, make purdy. If you can figure out which model I used, you get a prize.

Above is the first part I made- the cam.With the help from a friend with a schmancy super-secret shop, the part was cut of 1/2 inch steel plate (side note: scrounging around in the scrap section of Alco Metals is about as much fun as a gearhead like me can have. I got filthy!) using that most excelent of machines: an Omax water jet  cutter. It came out..dare i say it? Pretty dang sweet. I made two, because, well, why make one when you can make two at twice the price?

Tomorow: The cam follower, electronics,  troubleshooting