Bots, Blasters, Bugs, and a Bunch of Open Sauce Hardware

Featured image: Laura Mathews shows off her big mechanical wings.

Open Sauce, the engineering YouTube convention inspired by Maker Faire, once again invited makers to fill the San Mateo County Event Center with wacky projects for people to be impressed by. This was the second year the event was in San Mateo, and there were more exhibits filling up more rooms than before. Many exhibits were longtime favorites, like BattleBots teams, the amazing art car Project Empire (featured in Make: Volume 87), and giant inflatable costumes from Devising Delight (featured in Make: Volume 97). There were also plenty of first-time exhibitors who built a project just for the event. Though tickets aren’t cheap, this is not always the cheapest way to see the show (just ask the team who spent $9,000 turning a couch into a car). Make: was on site meeting familiar faces, and learning about new ones.

For those who couldn’t come to this gathering of makers, grab some sunscreen and your own water bottle, and see what delighted us.

Panels

YouTubers were at two stages all weekend, speaking about things like electronics, cosplay, and just what is YouTube about anyway? Attendees wishing to hear their favorite stars talk at 1x speed could learn which project was inspired by rage, who spent $50,000 not to make a video, and what’s the worst reason to start a channel now (money). For those determined to start anyway, the advice is the same as it’s always been, make a ton of videos.

I also heard visitors say they planned to watch the creators online later, they wanted to spend their precious time visiting the maker exhibits, such as:

Bay Area Droid Builders

The realistic builds from Bay Area Droid Builders never fail to impress. Droids from and inspired by Star Wars wandered around the event.

Bay Area Foam Tag

Bay Area Foam Tag (featured in upcoming Make: Volume 98) brought several members, more than several blasters, and seemingly infinite darts. Also one blaster taller than some of the players.

Hacker Dojo

Hacker Dojo, one of the oldest hackerspaces in Silicon Valley, is in danger of losing their space. All weekend they were giving away toy cars that kids could customize and take home. If you’re inclined, you can support them by contributing to their fundraiser, or bidding on the brick artwork above that looked way more incredible in person.

OddCube Air Purifier Kit

Air quality is increasingly a real (terrible) issue, and Joel Hartlaub is out to do something about it. Check out his Kickstarter for a kit to breathe easier.

Sesame

Maker Faire Bay Area blue ribbon-winner Dorian Todd brought Sesame, his tiny, affordable walking robot. The tabletop futbol match was pretty popular.

Whitcorp 3D Scanning

Whitcorp brought a 3D photogrammetry dome, and the most badass 3D printers I’ve ever seen.

Klorbiest Katch

A hall dedicated to gaming had a mix of indie video games and alt-ctrl creations. Bryan Racic built an open source 3D-printable nautical controller for seafaring games. He was demoing a definitely-not-crab fishing game called Klorbiest Catch where the player had to drop traps and collect “klorbs.”

A Giant Fly

Lexi Tayte and Jessica Crafternoon of giant Furby fame built a giant housefly because she’s been really into insects lately. The sculpture was built out of soft materials, and subverts the negative, instinctive human reaction to insects by magnifying the form and forcing viewers to confront it at human scale. Or they just really like bugs. It’s OK to just be fun.

Of course there was lots more to impress, even more than last year’s Open Sauce. The next one is already scheduled for July 17th & 18th, 2027. If you can’t wait ’till then, then I have great news for you (it’s Maker Faire Bay Area).