Ok, so I have a thing for local Science Museums. What are you gonna do about it? Me, I built an exhibit from scratch and donated it to the Science and Discovery Center of Northwest Florida. This exhibit is a simple game that pits two people against each other to find out who’s got the faster reaction time; and learn some things on the way! Powered by an Arduino, the electronics and construction are so basic I’m posting everything on GitHub and here for others to clone or improve upon. I bet there’s a local science museum near you that would love an exhibit like this. *wink*wink*

As you may have seen already, I enjoy volunteering for the local Science Museum. This time I took on rebuilding one of my favorite exhibits, Freeze Frame. The exhibit is simple, guests stand in front of a photo sensitive wall while a flash activates to ingrain their silhouette in the wall for a few minutes. The museum had one that had long since died and the previous volunteers simply ripped out all the parts except the photo sensitive wall and added an LED on a pen to let patrons ‘write with light’. While interesting, it’s not the same awe inspiring effect as Freeze Frame, so I took it on myself to resurrect the original function. This is how I did it.

My favorite local museum the Science and Discovery Center of Northwest Florida had broken exhibit that was collecting dust. They asked if I could fix it, and never one to back down from a challenge I set out to bring the Laser Spirograph back to life. What follows is how I fixed it and added options for new features!

In my little town known for Spring Break, there is a little museum called the Science and Discovery Center of Northwest Florida. I grew up in museums and love teaching kids science, so of course I am on a first name basis with everyone at the Center. In fact I have started volunteering to make improvements and repair exhibits. They don’t have a big budget, in fact they only have 2-3 full time staff so any improvements or repairs has to be done on the cheap. This is how I added some much needed ambiance to two of the exhibit rooms without breaking the bank. I’ve documented what I did here so other non-profit museums can replicate the design.

Who needs an amplifier when you’ve got a million volts to work with?

Introducing Tesla Hero, an RGB LED adorned Guitar Hero Controller interfaced with a Dual Resonant Solid State Tesla Coil (DRSSTC).  That’s right, Guitar Hero on a Tesla Coil. It was only a matter of time.

Last night was the first live show by the ‘Science Brothers’ starring yours truly! The show was part of an event called the ‘STEM Community Forum’ at FSU Panama City. There were multiple sources filming the show and taking pictures, so check back for more media. Until then, a quick clip from the local news covering the event:

As you can read in my short autobiography, I love all things science and working with kids. Therefore I especially love getting kids interested in science and feel it’s very important to bring more STEM (Science Technology Engineering Mathematics) into the classroom. Thankfully I work for the US Navy, which has excellent education outreach and STEM programs.