Brent Bushnell » technology

DieHard commercials

brent — Sat, 10 Jul 2010 17:56:28 +0000

They Syyn Labs team had a good time helping DieHard batteries, Young & Rubicam, James Frost & Zoo Films with their latest commercials. In one video we obliterated a battery with an elephant gun and it still started a car! In the second, we turned 24 white and black cars into a huge piano controlled by a MIDI keyboard. Gary Numan played his song Cars on it, and the whole thing was powered by a single battery! The piano is embedded below and visit YouTube for the Elephant Gun.

Update: the video was covered by Wired, BoingBoing, and Gizmodo!

ArtWalk Spring ‘10

brent — Sun, 11 Apr 2010 00:25:39 +0000

The Spring 2010 Brewery Artwalk will be taking place in downtown Los Angeles the weekend of 4/17/10-4/18/10. Artists will have their lofts open from 11am-6pm both days. If you haven’t been, the event is a blast and a fun way to see much of the eclectic offerings of the Brewery residents.

Virsix will be open to the public too, but with a much more serious purpose. Finally revealing ourselves as the Virsix Institute of Counter Espionage (V.I.C.E.) we are dedicated to neutralizing current global threats without the restrictions of government intervention. We’ll be evaluating the weekend’s attendees, looking for the most promising new recruits. Do you have what it takes to join our ranks? The world needs you. Visit our location to learn more.

Directions to our facility are available here
Join the Virsix mailing list and follow on Twitter for updates.
Visit the Brewery ArtWalk main site for more information.
Learn more about V.I.C.E.

OK Go Rube Goldberg Music Video

brent — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 22:45:14 +0000

The minds (and bodies) of Syyn Labs spent the past three months building a huge, two-story Rube Goldberg machine during which a piano gets dropped and a TV is smashed with a sledge hammer. Why? It’s the centerpiece for the latest music video from the band OK Go (remember… the guys who did the treadmill video). It features the song “This Too Shall Pass” and even after listening to it hundreds of times, it still sounds good!

Huge thanks to the band for this opportunity and to all the Syyn Labs and Mindshare folks that helped pull this together. Special recognition to Adam Sadowsky for orchestrating the whole thing like a pro conductor. Thanks to all the people that helped make my vision for the Legos a reality! Namely: Dylan Bushnell, Heather Knight, Liya Brook, Paul Grasshoff, Peter Svidler, Izumi Hamagaki, Wyatt Bushnell, Sam Leventer, and Mahdroo McCaleb. Hats off to the steady camera man, a major hero for his ability to capture this on film! Thanks to the magical eye of Josh Reiss for capturing photos of the whole thing too!

Updates:

The video was covered on NY Times, CNN, Examiner, Wired, Makezine, NPR, NBC Los Angeles, BoingBoing 1st, BoingBoing 2nd, DVICE, Gizmodo 1st, Gizmodo 2nd & PerezHilton!
An interesting article showing the statistics on the “viral effect” of the video is available at the Viral Blog
A few previews from before the launch available at Rolling Stone, LA Times and AltPress
LACMA is featuring a few components from the machine, including the Legos! There will be a concert fundraiser on March 5th, 2010. For tickets call 323 857-6010 or visit the LACMA site
More info on the project and the release is available here
There’s now a Wikipedia article about it.
OK Go won a webby! More info here.
A panorama of the top floor, courtesy of Pehr Hovey, is available here (1.5MB JPG)

Entrepreneur Resources

brent — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 08:15:01 +0000

Crowd-sourced funding platforms:
Kickstarter.com: A site where users can propose projects and the public can pledge funds to them
IndieGoGo.com: A competitor to Kickstarter

Loans:
Prosper.com: Lend or borrow money at varying rates.
On Deck Capital: Small business loans

Angel Networks:
Tech Coast Angels: A southern California network. Free to pitch.
Keiretsu Forum: Networks of angels in LA, the Bay Area and the Pacific Northwest. They charge around $6000 to present to multiple regional chapters.
Maverick Angels: A network of angels in southern California. They charge $1500 to present to multiple regional chapters.
Open Angel Forum: Jason Calacanis’ free forum to pitch angels. It was catalyzed by the large fees some networks charge to pitch.
FundingPost: Events that match investors with entrepreneurs

Mentor Networks:
The Founder Institute: An international program pairing entrepreneurs with mentors over a semester long course

Pitch help:
Startup Nation Elevator Pitch: Help putting together an elevator pitch
OmniDazzle: A plugin (OSX only) that helps jazz up presentations
Prezi.com: A website that allows creating visual map presentations.
Mint.com Investor Pitch deck: An example of a great pitch deck

Document Templates:
Executive Summary: A sample from DocStoc
Term sheet templates: Y Combinator, WSGR

Events:
Startup Weekend: Conference where attendees create a new startup in 54 hours.
Twiistup: Conference that showcase a select group of startups.
The Launch Conference: Jason Calacanis’ rebirth of the TechCrunch50 event.
socaltech.com, coloft.com, and TechZulu.com all maintain calendars of SoCal events.
Others events include: Barcamp SD, Under the Radar, HackerSpaces, Caltech/MIT Venture Forum and UCLA Entrepreneurs Conference

General:
Help a Starup Out: List of resources for startups.
Startup Digest: emails about startups in your area
TheFunded.com: A site for entrepreneurs to share experiences with funding sources

Twitter:
VentureHacks: Advice for startups from some of the investors in Twitter. Their AngelList is a great resource too.
Mark Suster: Los Angeles VC looking for passionate entrepreneurs

Inspiration
Beautiful video created by Grasshopper.com

UCLA Hammer Museum

brent — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 06:29:12 +0000

Tyler Bushnell and I spent Saturday at a party at the UCLA Hammer Museum in Westwood. We were slated to bring our Laser Maze but the fire marshall thought the particulates in the fog machine would anger the smoke detectors. We fell back to bringing the party table and 3D game. Despite the setback, I must say the attendees had a ball! There were some great other pieces onsite including a not-so-subtle twist on Rodin's Thinker.

Puck Hunt

brent — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 00:29:12 +0000

Eric Gradman, Tyler Bushnell, and I have been collaborating on a platform for social gaming that uses a handheld wireless RFID reader and a bunch of RFID tags scattered around a venue. We tested an early prototype at the H+ conference the beginning of December and will bring the next revision to Mindshare this week. My favorite aspect is the flexibility. The number of sensors and outputs we put on the puck allows for a broad array of possible games including various scavenger hunts, puzzles and competitions. A video and more technical breakdown is available here.

Update: We were covered on Makezine, Hackaday and Engadget!

ArtWalk Fall ‘09

brent — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 21:11:48 +0000

Wow! What a weekend. The Virsix showroom was alive and packed during the biannual Brewery ArtWalk. We had five of our games available and people ages 5 to 70 competing away! Players tested their cat burgling skills in the Laser Maze, avoided traffic in our foot tracking Frogger-style game, contorted their body for human Tetris, and even flew around the galaxy in a space battle. Thanks to all involved for their help putting this on, especially the guys at H2P for a marvelous job filming.

Modular Truss Solutions

brent — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 22:49:19 +0000

I’ve been on the hunt for a truss solution that could be easily reconfigured for different applications. It turns out the options are not immediately apparent, but with a little searching there are some gems. Here are the results of my research thus far:

UltraBeam
Unistrut
80/20
Kee Klamps
SpeedRail
Global Truss
Truss Works
There are a number of Chinese solutions for modular aluminum. Meike, Al Fang, Ouyu

Thanks to Troy, Richard and Eric for suggestions.

Welcome to L.A. – What now?

brent — Sun, 09 Aug 2009 19:56:05 +0000

I’ve occasionally sent out an email to recent LA transplants to help speed integration. I’ll put it here in case it’s useful to others.

For art, music and fun subscribe to Flavorpill: newsletter, Twitter

For cerebral stimulus, networking (and an open bar), come to the monthly Mindshare event

If you’re pursuing the entertainment/media dream explore Hollywood Hill

A large, interesting artist community downtown called The Brewery with a biannual art exhibition called Artwalk and a mailing list here.

For technology networking there’s G33k D1nner, DigitalLA, BarcampLA

My favorite art galleries: Gallery 1988, Crewest, Think Space

Interesting classes and events on a *wide* range of topics available from Machine Project, The Public School

Other LA gems: cemetery movie screenings, a great music venue in a guitar shop, a female roller skate derby, a magic castle, and a circus

Twitterers: DoSomethingNew, LA Weekly, Alexia Tsotsis

For the geek tourist: Top 10 Geek Destinations in LA

Food (work in progress)

Pizza: Quick, Fancy
Japanese: Noodles, Tokyo Grill, Sushi
Hamburgers: Institution, Best Veggie and Toppings
Food trucks: Korean, Peruvian/Japanese, Organic
Cheese: Store, Cafe & Market, Wine Bar
Breakfast: Hugo's Restaurant, Nickel Diner, DoughBoys, Campanile (Weekend Brunch)

Party Table

brent — Sat, 25 Apr 2009 00:27:39 +0000

The party table has been a pet project and passion of mine for a few years now. It’s a six player game table that consists of a screen (either LCD or projection) surrounded by trackballs and arcade buttons. The device is more of a game platform than just another arcade unit. So far, it has a few simple games including a 6 player ping-pong, a light cycle game similar to Tron, and a game where players race through a maze. A bunch of other games are in the development pipeline including a race car game, a tank defense game and shuffleboard. An important aspect of the unit is that it accommodates 6 players. Six is an interesting number socially. People will usually go out to bars and restaurants in groups of 2-4 so a game that allows 6 players usually means that the players are meeting someone new around the table. Stimulating social interaction and making new friends is a focal point of the table.