Hasta La Gadget!

Piet De Vaere read about a hack made by Steve Hoefer, in which Steve made is to he could unlock his door using a secret knock. Piet was becoming annoyed that he had to take out his keys to unlock his gate, so he decided to mimic Steve’s project to solve his first world problem, except he decided to make a secret doorbell code.

Piet calls his project Janus: The gatekeeper. When Piet rings his doorbell, Janus intercepts the input and compares it with the prerecorded unlock sequence. If the input matches, then the gate opens. If not, a bell rings. Skip to 0:24 to see Janus at work, then to 0:52 to see his brain, which is based on a mehduino.

Head to Piet’s blog for more details on Janus. For obvious reasons Piet doesn’t recommend rigging Janus on your main door. It would be cool and more secure if you can pair it with another layer of geeky gatekeeping, perhaps voice activation. Or you can use it to beef up your current gate and make it so it won’t unlock unless you use your key and enter the secret doorbell code.

[via Hack A Day]

We’ve seen a few Steve Jobs action figures try to come to market over the last few years. So far, Apple has stepped in and crushed every single one of those action figures. An artist going by the name XVALA has decided to make his own Steve Jobs “sculptures” that are sure to come under fire by Apple’s legal squad.

The artist started by using M.I.C. Gadget’s Steve Jobs action figure that was discontinued after Apple’s legal team laid into the company. The action figure shows Jobs wearing his trademark attire, and holding an iPhone in his hand. To make the statuette his own, XVALA uses his patented plastic porcelain material to coat the action figure turning it into a “work of art.”

According to the artist, the plastic porcelain material is mixed with the resin made of recycled trash from Steve Jobs’ home. The artist is also creating a sculpture coated in black to bring attention to the Foxconn manufacturing plant suicides. The sculptures are being displayed in the Corey Allen Contemporary Art Gallery and gallery owner says the production of the sculpture will continue with or without Apple approval.

[via Cacanet]

Over the years, we’ve featured some pretty incredible cakes (and cupcakes) here on Technabob, but to date, we’ve never seen one that had projected, interactive images on it. Well, Disney, being Disney, has been working on the idea for a few years now, and recently was awarded a patent for the technology.

The patent abstract reads as follows:

A method for digitally augmenting or enhancing a food product such as the surface or top of a cake or other edible object. The method includes generating an augmentation media file based on a projection surface of the food product such as a digital movie or image that is mapped to the 3D topography of projection surface and that is projected on the food product using a properly aligned projector. Interactivity is provided by having the method include determining a modification or change of the 3D topography of the projection surface and, based upon the modification, generating a modified augmentation media file and operating the projector to use the modified augmentation media file to project a modified projected image on the food product. The method further provides interactivity by detecting a user interaction with the projection surface and generating a modified augmentation media file based on this tracked interaction.

So think Microsoft Surface PixelSense, but on a cake. Here it is projecting an image of a baby, turning into a backpack-wearing kid, and then into a basketball player. Sure, why not?

The technology could work with complex topographies and interact differently depending on the section. For instance, a cake could have a river rolling through the middle of a valley, and touching the water would make it splash or change directions without affecting the hills around it.

It could even display personalized messages on slices of cake as they are removed from the main cake.

As intellectual property lawyers are known to do, this patent protects Disney in the event that someone wants to make any food that uses a projector and lets you interact with its surface. Granted, the ideas of an interactive, augmented display already have tons of prior art, but in terms of baked goods, Disney was apparently in the clear.

You can check out the full patent over at Google Patents.

[via r/gadgets]

These monster body parts light switch plates are disgustingly awesome. They are perfect for any Halloween party or haunted house. They are completely gross, but amazing.

I used to be scared when I turned the lights off, but now I think I would be even more scared with the lights on. With the lights on, you can see all of the horrible details on these handmade switch plates and you know they will get you. Of course, in the dark, you’d feel all that weirdness when you reach for the switch, too. These plates are made with polymer clay over a standard sized light switch cover and painted with acrylics, matte varnish and gloss varnish.

You can find them at dogzillalives‘ Etsy shop for about $55-60(USD). Hit the link for more gruesome images.

[via Obvious Winner]

I have nothing against the color black, but when it comes to my food, I’d prefer it to be not black. I don’t know what Burger King Japan was thinking when they rolled out their black-bunned Kuro Burger (JP), but it probably wasn’t about customers with my dining  preferences.

That said, I still think Kuro Burger will be a huge hit with Japanese fast food lovers, because it’s too unusual to pass up with its black buns and black sauce.

The dough of the buns have been mixed with bamboo charcoal to turn it deathly black, while the sauce is a mixture of squid ink and spices to give it that creepily zesty oomph.

Oh, and did I mention that Burger King came up with this black burger as part of its fifth anniversary in Japan? They probably thought black was a festive color that was fit for the occasion. Burger Kings all over Japan will begin serving these black burgers on September 28th. If you happen to be in the area, give it a try and tell us if its any good.

Funny thing is, this isn’t the first time we’ve seen a burger with a black bun – French chain Quick offered a special Darth Vader burger earlier this year with a similar look.

[via RocketNews24 via Obvious Winner]