Hasta La Gadget!

We’ve seen a way to play drums using normal objects and even a steering wheel. DrumPants takes on the final frontier: you. Despite its misleading name, DrumPants are not actually pants or even restricted to pants. They’re wearable drum pads that attach to clothing and other objects using velcro.

Each kit comes with two drum pad strips, two pedal strips i.e. foot sensors and a control box, which seems small enough to fit in your back pocket. The foot sensors are wired to the two strips, which are in turn wired to the control box. The box has more than a hundred built-in sounds, including other instruments such as synthesizers, guitars and pianos.

Pledge at least $99 (USD) on Kickstarter to get a DrumPants kit as a reward. As hinted at in the video above, DrumPants can be connected to other music apps. It can even be used to emulate keyboard strokes, meaning you can use them to control even non-music software. If you’re interested in these additional functions, make sure to get the kit that comes with a Bluetooth adapter so you can interact with your computer wirelessly. Check out DrumPants’ YouTube page for more demos of the kit.

How good are you at solving Rubik’s cubes? I’m not ashamed to admit that I’m particularly bad at it. In fact, I have yet to successfully solve a 3×3 cube and I’ve been trying for five years and counting already.

If the usual handheld cubes are starting to bore you and you happen to be in Austria, then you might want to drop by the Ars Electronica center in Linz. The building’s facade is actually covered in 1,085 glass panes that are illuminated by 95,000 color-changing LED lights. It has been used by a number of artists as a medium for their work.

The latest is Javier Lloret, who turned the building into a game. Specifically, he turned it into a giant Rubik’s cube, and he’s calling it the Puzzle Facade.

The interface-cube holds electronic components to keep track of rotation and orientation. This data is sent via Bluetooth to a computer that runs the Puzzle Facade designed software. This software changes the lights and color of the large-scale Ars Electronica’s media facade in correlation to the handheld interface-cube.

Puzzle Facade is made more challenging since the player can only see two sides at a time. However, it’s not really a huge factor since the player can flip and rotate and interface cube.

The Puzzle Facade is part of Lloret’s thesis for the Interface Culture master program at the University of Arts and Industrial Design Linz.

[via C|NET]

Yeah, there’s a computer in here somewhere. This is Japanese designer Hiroto Ikeuchi’s award-winning casemod, which is basically a toy diorama that erupted over a PC. According to Wired, Hiroto calls the diorama his “secret base.” It’s filled with soldiers, mecha and guns along with gadgets, electronics and trinkets made to look like weapons or heavy machinery.

You can see more pictures of Hiroto’s casemod on photographer Rakutaro’s blog. You should also check out Hiroto’s website and his blog to see more of his work.

[via Wired via Ubergizmo]

LEGO expert Raul Oaida and Steve Sammartino have built themselves the stuff of childhood dreams for many LEGO builders. I know I wanted to build a full-size car I could drive around the neighborhood more times than I can count. Their incredible black and yellow LEGO hot rod consists of over half a million bricks.

This is very cool indeed and the project is known as the Super Awesome Micro Project. It’s unclear exactly how the LEGO-based motor of the car works, but it is said to run on compressed air. The engine has four radial units with 256 pistons. The car isn’t made completely from LEGO, there are some structural pieces, wheels, and tires. I would assume there is some sort of frame that isn’t LEGO.

The car can cruise at speeds of up to 18MPH. It might be able to go faster, but they won’t drive it any faster because of its fragile nature. The car was taken from a concept design to a finished product in 20 months. Incredibly, Oaida built it in Romania, and shipped it to Sammartino for final assembly in Melbourne, Australia.

[via Geek.com via Crave Australia via C|NET]

This video by PistolShrimps recasts Batman into scenes of classic Christmas movies. I admit I don’t recognize all of the movies in the clip, though I do see It’s A Wonderful Life, A Christmas Carol and A Christmas Story in there, so those are the big ones.

Though that scene doesn’t feature Batman, rather it’s Bane being taunted by Scut Farkas before beating the stuffing out of him. I also recognized some scenes from one of those Santa Clause movies.

It’s pretty funny to see Batman in these roles. My favorite is when the little girl signs her name in sign language. You’ll have to watch to see what Batman thinks she means.

[via Nerd Approved]