i started a tumblr blog to post images that i love. check it.

http://welcometothewilderness.tumblr.com

me and my first handmade kite

recently i have become mildly obsessed with kites and the fun had by flying them. there’s something surreal about taking a piece of fabric and opening it up and having the wind carry it up with just a rope between the two of you, carrying all the sounds and thoughts back and forth. i decided the only thing better than flying a kite would be flying a kite you made, and giving the kites away to people you love.

so, you want a kite? this is the basics of what you’re going to need, depending on the kind of kite, sewing and configuring will be a little different, but here’s some resources to get you started.

1) ripstop nylon - the body of the operation. this is the main fabric for the kite. you can use other things like tyvek or paper, pretty much any light material will do if you have the patience. i went the tried and true route of ripstop nylon, essentially a reinforced nylon that is super light, virtually wind proof (which means your kite gets more lift per wind), possibly UV resistant (depends on the kind you choose), and extremely resistant to wear. you can get it in different weights, i suggest the lighter the better. searching around for some 3/4-oz is a good idea, but 1-oz will do as well. sourcing it can be tricky or easy, depending on how much you want to spend. i was told to ask my local parachute shop for scrap, but could not find my local parachute shop, so i had to buy some from a local kite supplier. try to support your local kite supplier/builder, they are a dying breed and are usually so happy to help someone building up their first kite and will you give you all kinds of great insider tricks and tips, and you get to connect with some wonderful heritage. (if you’re in oregon/washington i really recommend Herb at Mainframe Kite shop, nicest guy in the world who will help you make sure you have all the gear you need and ship you extra material cause its just lying around!) there are different prices on ripstop depending on whether you get first, second, or third round ripstop, which varies in production quality. i went for second round as its cheaper but still perfectly fine. also, ripstop doesn’t mold which is great if it gets wet!

2) sewing machine - the cajones of the operation, a solid sewing machine is unbeatable. the older and more steel/metal components the better. the one thing i was running into a lot was a problem with feed rates. ripstop is very slick so there’s not much friction between two panels you’re sewing, leading to fabric bunching problems if the feed dog and throat plate aren’t working in perfect unison. a trick i started using was using scotch tape so they couldnt slip, but prevented puncturing holes via the standard pinning method.

3) patterns - the brains of the operation. choose/design your pattern careful young jedi. i was going to sew a closed-cell parafoil at first but later decided on a flow form. both of these are soft kites meaning there are no rigid beams or supports, instead the air inflates cells (similar to a kite-boarding kite) which gives the kite its shape and rigidity. these are great for packing up and carrying around the city or on backpacking trips, and they make great hats in rain! the best site in the world for patterns is probably kiteplans.org. there are some great resources out there, just google around and you’ll find plenty of pictures and details. cutting the patterns can be tricky, i used some CAD programs to generate my curved profiles, so you can get XY coordinates for the camber and then use a flexible line (fishing rods work great) to connect the dots in a continuous curve. since i was making a lot of the same pieces, i cut templates out of cardboard that i could reuse and easily trace the patterns onto the ripstop before cutting with scissors. (note, a lot of people say to cut the ripstop with a heat knife/soldering iron to seal the edges of the ripstop so it does not fray, i found this unnecessary, especially considering the french seams).

4) fly line/bridle line/attachment points - this is the duct tape of the operation? these are what connects you to the kite, so make sure its good, kites love the wind so much sometimes they untie their knots and fly away. fly line is the long line, while bridle line is lighter line used to attach the attachment points on the kite to the bridle line. usually a swivel (fishing lure swivels are common) is used to prevent the string from wrapping on itself. depending on the size of your kite you’ll have to spec out your fly line to match the guestimated force on the kite, for a 1m^2 kite i used a 50lb dacron braided line which has worked great. some people err on the side of safety, in that case, there’s 1000lb test line (seriously).

5) winder - get a winder so you can coil your rope! the 6″ yo-yo winders are great and cheap, and easily DIYable with some wood and a lathe.

if you’ve made it this far it’s pretty easy: measure twice, cut once, sew once, seam rip a million times, sew again, turn inside out, smile big and run down the hall with it!

not happy with all the year end lists? make your own then.

#1) animal collective - merriweather post pavillion

#2) atlas sound - logos

#3) animal collective - fall be kind

#4) mount eerie - wind’s poem

#5) phoenix - wolfgang amadeus phoenix

#6) antlers - hospice

#7) the king khan and bbq show - invisible girl

#8) fuck buttons - tarot sport

#9) girls - album

#10 lotus plaza - lotus plaza

Music Map Output

http://www2.research.att.com/~yifanhu/MusicMap/index.html

really cool visualization of connection between artists and genres creating a virtual country using data pulled from last.fm. i do find it disconcerting that classical music is out there on an island. shouldnt it be at the center of the country?

got all the letters loading as points and am now thinking how to push these into a continuously changing particle system. potentially way too many particles though. there are about 3000 letters in this image, each letter is defined by on average 5000 points, thats 1.5 million particles to keep track of every frame. the other problem is the letters change depending on brightness, so morphing between points of different letters is going to be tricky. should be cool though when your face particles erode off screen constantly like sand though.

i just finished the 6th episode for the radio show ive been doing at the MIT radio station. i’ve been doing a show there with a friend gina every friday night at 8pm, each week ive been making compositions using sound generated from dynamic movements in videos through a synthesizer. its been good, ive been slowly learning how to program the synth to the point that it produces the sound i envision beforehand and this week, for the first time, i actually managed to do that. the beginning of this weeks song is exactly how i wanted it to sound…first time that’s really happened, so i’m super motivated now. just gotta keep on making the noise…

full episode here –> http://response.welcometothewilderness.org/audio/responseEpisode6.mp3

i’ve been diggin watching movies on my computer real-time encoded to ascii movies. it makes me think of simpler times…