Hasta La Gadget!

Cars nowadays come with TPMS sensors which basically let you know when you have a flat tire by monitoring your tire’s pressure. However the same cannot be said for bicycles, at least until now when a Kickstarter project has been launched called the BTPS – Bike Tire Pressure System, in which its creators are hoping to bring to bicycles what car drivers have been enjoying for the past few years. However since bicycles do not come with built-in dashboards or heads up displays, how the BTPS works is that it will relay the information to your smartphone via an app and will accurately read the pressure of your tires between 0 and 174psi. Granted it’s not as convenient as the car version, but for cyclists who cycle often we’re guessing that this is a bonus feature that many wouldn’t mind having, not to mention it helps to ensure that their bike’s tires are regularly inflated.

The BTPS itself weighs about 7 grams so it should add any unnecessary bulk or weight to your ride, and according to its Kickstarter page, the BTPS will be mounted on the rim tape when used with tubeless tires, or stuck directly onto the tube when used with tubed tires. A pledge of $140 will guarantee you the device upon successful funding, so if you’d like to learn more or pledge a donation, head on over to its Kickstarter page for the details.

By Ubergizmo. Related articles: This Steampunk arm guard comes with a working Bluetooth keyboard, Parrot Asteroid Mini Picks Up FCC Approval,

The perpetual challenge of developing an iPhone-friendly gamepad (or any phone-oriented gamepad) is the bulk, either for a gargantuan case or else a separate controller. If Justice Frangipane’s team and iDevices have their way, that clunkiness will be a distant memory. Their proposed FlipSide case for iPhones (we see a prototype here) centers on Bluetooth 4.0 gamepad controls that stay clipped to the back when just checking email, but attach to the front for playtime. They’ll save us from hunting down a wall outlet, too; the combination of a sensitive solar cell and a thin film battery from Infinite Power Solutions should keep the case powered up through even indoor lighting. The only real challenge is getting the case produced, as Frangipane is looking for crowdfunding to make the FlipSide a reality. Provided his group makes its donation target, though, there’s the prospect of an Android version — so those who don’t play the iOS way could still reap the rewards if they chip in at the source link.

Continue reading FlipSide case for iPhone packs stealthy game controls, plays on solar power (video)

Filed under: Cellphones, Gaming, Peripherals, Mobile, Apple

Comments

Source: Flipside (Kickstarter)

Do you ever find yourself wondering how good your dice are? Because I do. Are they really random? Or do slight imperfections in their design favor one number over another? It’s impossible to know. Unless you have precision machined dice. And while you’re precision-machining some dice, why not make them in a variety of rare and exotic metals? Those are the questions Tuscon college student Amber Rix created her Kickstarter project to answer.

Launched December 6, the Precision Machined Dice project on Kickstarter currently sits at $32,701, over 10 times its initial funding goal of $3,000. It aims to deliver American-made, six-sided dice in a variety of metals, including aluminum, stainless steel, copper, brass, titanium and tungsten to backers, but not just any old dice. These are precision machined according to exact mathematical standards, to ensure that each die has a precisely (or as near as is feasible) equal chance to land on any one of its six sides. Rix has a very in-depth mathematical explanation of how she hopes to achieve that, but essentially it amounts to drilling different hole depths on each face depending on how many pips are present, in order to balance the cube’s overall mass.

I’m not going to pretend I understand the math at work here. Rix’s explanation on the Kickstarter page is likely a much better read than whatever insight I can provide if you’re after the nerdy nitty-gritty.

I asked Rix why she wanted to make these to begin with, and at its heart the project is about delivering perfection to everyday folks. “If you’re going to do something you might as well do it right, right?” she said.  ”I could have very easily made cubed chunks of metal with drilled pips, but all of a sudden with a little more time and effort these chunks of metal become near perfect precision ‘cuts’ of metal. Rare metals. They are novelty items that no one else in the world may have.”

Personally, Rix was moved by her love of computer-aided drafting and product design to come up with these dice. As a college student working on graphic design and CAD, she wanted to make something that would help her share that passion with the rest of the world.

“I get the biggest thrill from making something digitally and then eventually being able to hold what I made in my hand, that’s why I love CAD so much,” she explained. “And nothing is worth doing if you don’t give it your all, so I made them precision. Anyone can make a cube in CAD or Solidworks, but its harder to make it precision, and the extra work makes the reward of completion a hundred times better.”

The stretch goal for the project was to get enough funding to be able to make dice out of relatively expensive tungsten metal. Now, the project has reached that level, and Rix has bigger dreams, including creating dice out of Damascus steel, and possibly even silver. She also would now like to look into the possibility of making her precision dice a product that continues beyond the initial Kickstarter shipment, sold through Amazon or perhaps her own website. Other potential projects could involve D4 through D20 dice, likely an attractive prospect to the perfectionist DnD-er, and a full game board created from precision-crafted metal.

A few years ago in Prague I met a guy named Jeffrey Martin who is one of the world’s best panoramic photographers. At that time he had a bunch of weird hardware that took mostly panoramic photos but he’s since branched out to video, building his own methods for capturing 360-degree scenes. The Sphericam is his invention and it looks pretty amazing.

The project is now on Kickstarter and for $599 you can get the entry-level model which includes:

More expensive units include more features topping out at $2,000 for a unit with WiFi streaming and a huge battery for field reporting. Obviously this isn’t for the the dabbler, but it’s still cool that you can get a device that essentially videos an entire environment for less than a price of an entry-level DSLR.

The device takes 1280×1024 video using four 640×512 cameras with 170-degree fisheye lenses. It records directly onto an SD card (or via the network) and includes a small monitor. Jeffrey is doing the engineering in Prague and hopes to commercialize the technology after completing the Kickstarter. He’s off to a very good start.

Why would you want this? Well, you can grab some odd and clever effects like this fisheye video of, well, fish.

You can also take wild video like the bike ride above, which is perfect if you’re making something to show at your next rave or LSD-ingesting party. He’s looking for $10,000, which shouldn’t be hard considering the pricing.

You can check out the Sphericam project here and look at more video.

The iPhone and iPod touch, two devices that run on the iOS platform, have managed to carve a name for themselves in the world of portable gaming. Of course, they are not capable of offering the kind of gaming experiences that you find on the triple A titles on the PS Vita and Nintendo 3DS, but you know for sure that there is still a fair share of titles on the iOS platform that can keep you captivated for hours on end. Well, a full touchscreen interface is not the most ideal way to game, which is why this Kickstarter idea came about – the WynCASE iOS game case that comes in an extremely slim form factor, sporting actual physical buttons without the need for batteries at all.

This Kickstarter project is a compact protective case that will transform your iOS-powered device into what they call a “true mobile game console.” Thanks to WynLABS patent-pending BridgeTOUCH technology, it will make full use of the touchscreen, minimizing latency to make it ideal for fast-action games. Not only that, it doubles up as a protective case for your iOS device, now how about that? $80,000 is the amount that the WynCASE requires, so you can place your pre-order for $30 a pop.

By Ubergizmo. Related articles: Final Fantasy IV heading to iOS 20th December, Xbox SmartGlass iOS App Receives iPhone 5 Support,