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Comment on Steampunk Jar of Articulated Fireflies by stillkickn

Fri, 28 Sep 2007 15:51:49 -0500

At 28-Sep-2007 15:51:49, stillkickn posted:

Hey Jesse,
Pretty kool man. how long did it lake u to determine the paths os the bb's. looks very intricate!
just a thought, if u paint the wire framework inside the jar black, u shouldnt b able to c em reflecting the light from the LED's.

Comment on Steampunk Jar of Articulated Fireflies by jesse

Wed, 15 Aug 2007 22:04:38 -0500

At 15-Aug-2007 22:04:38, jesse posted:

Brad emailed me with a question, I thought I would put it here because of its relevance...

Hey Jesse,
I've been keeping track of your creations since I first saw your steampunk firefly jar on BoingBoing, and I must say I'm always very impressed with your work.
The fireflies, however, were by far the most fascinating of your creations (to me, anyway).
I've been wanting to make one myself, but I've never had any experience in working with wire contraptions (like the sculptures by Arthur Ganson). I haven't actually tried playing around with them yet, but I can't quite work it out in my head how it would be best to put it together, heh. I was wondering if you might be able to offer me any advice or help with it?

Thanks,
Brad

My response...

Wirework has a bit of a learining curve. Arthur Ganson uses steel and welds his wire together, I use brass wire and solder it together, its a difference of a few hundred degrees I think. Brass is the less scary of the two for sure, no white hot flame, no sparks, no expensive welding kit...but its also less strong.

Stop by a welding store to get your brass rods and get a solder gun or a small torch (like a confectioners torch or a butane wind proof BBQ lighter) normally in soldering you need a litle speck of heat, but in wirework there is a lot more heating that you will need to do, the torches work great.

With your brass wire try to bend some pieces that work together like a simple crank that pumps a see-saw or something, try to bend up a wire gear, this bending practice will help you learn where to grab the wire with your pliers when trying to acomplish a right angle. Try to make a tiny series of loops that fits over another wire just right to grip it when soldered (play around a lot)

Make sure when soldering youyr pieces to have strong connections with lots of surface area! if joining two perpendicular wires, file the surfacs so they have maximum contact. You may wrap one end of one around the other wire, or wrap the intersection in very thin fine copper wire and fill this "wire sponge" up with solder.

Somehing absolutly necessary when doing wire work is to get a set of "Helping Hands" this is a small ball joint device with aligator clips to hold little pieces of wire in contact as you connect them, without it there is a huge challenge.

Also be sure to use structural solder available at hardware stores in the plumbing section and USE FLUX (follow directions online for fluxing) this allows the solder to flow over the filed surfaces of the wire.

A good tutorial on soldering (explaining the intricacies of heat transfer, tinning etc. can be found here)
http://www.makezine.com/blog/archive/2007/01/soldering_tutor_1.html

Finally, try to draw your gizmo before you start working on it so that you have a plan, otherwise you will sit for hours visualizing it when you could be working!

Have fun feel free to ask more questions.

Jesse

Comment on Steampunk Jar of Articulated Fireflies by jesse

Tue, 26 Jun 2007 00:42:22 -0500

At 26-Jun-2007 00:42:22, jesse posted:

Today was the last time something impressed me. I was on a walk with my wife and asked her "what's the weirdest thing that could happen right now?" For the next ten minutes she hauled my brain around crazy land in a bizarro boat. Gigantic Rubber chickens riding unicycles made completely of lobsters with a hat made from a roller coaster. The hallelujah chorus in tow all naked except for one man wearing a suit made of lily pads all over except over his junk, somewhere on the head there was a couple of clowns with trees growing from there eyes. I didn't realize QUITE how active her imagination was.

The time before that was two days ago, I was putting a broken set of projectors from a projection TV into the back of our car (it looks like a time machine sorta) and turned to ponder some really amazing clouds that seemed to be glowing, when a pack of coyotes close by all started making the most crazy noise, they sounded like hyenas, babies crying, a lobster being dropped into boiling water, and laughter all at once. I told my mother in law "It feels surreal" and it was...I loved that. (true story by the way) DO you or does anyone else have moments like that?

Comment on Steampunk Jar of Articulated Fireflies by vinklspinkl

Mon, 25 Jun 2007 12:33:01 -0500

At 25-Jun-2007 12:33:01, vinklspinkl posted:

I really liked it, Jesse. It is beautiful. I saw fireflies for the first time in India three years ago, and I was bursting out: look! stars in the trees! The others were laughing at me (of course), but I feel sorry for people not having the ability to get that carried away. When was the last time something impressed you?

Comment on Steampunk Jar of Articulated Fireflies by frohickey

Mon, 25 Jun 2007 09:44:08 -0500

At 25-Jun-2007 09:44:08, frohickey posted:

Sweet! Beautifully made and elegant.

Comment on Steampunk Jar of Articulated Fireflies by jesse

Sun, 24 Jun 2007 13:21:00 -0500

At 24-Jun-2007 13:21:00, jesse posted:

THe final song is called "Prelude For Lute" from the CD "Thumbsing" by the artist named Richard Gilewitz.

Comment on Steampunk Jar of Articulated Fireflies by soops

Sun, 24 Jun 2007 10:51:37 -0500

At 24-Jun-2007 10:51:37, soops posted:

You have to tell me what the second tune is on the video, i HAVE to learn how to play that! Also, nice inventions dude!

Comment on Steampunk Jar of Articulated Fireflies by kleucht

Sun, 24 Jun 2007 09:40:14 -0500

At 24-Jun-2007 09:40:14, kleucht posted:

Very cool!

Comment on Steampunk Jar of Articulated Fireflies by natetrue

Sun, 24 Jun 2007 09:31:22 -0500

At 24-Jun-2007 09:31:22, natetrue posted:

Awesome Jesse! Beautiful and very well-done video. I love how the UV stuff turned out too.