diy

How to take your own passport photos

Drugstores will charge you as much as $10-15 for a measly photo, adding insult to injury when you're tied up in a long and expensive passport application process.

If you're willing to pay the price for convenience, so be it, but if you like to "DIY," you'll be happy to hear that taking your own passport photos is actually pretty simple.

You'll need:

A digital camera (or smartphone) Computer A photo printer (or local photo printing center)

Easy enough, right? Now follow the steps to take your passport photos, DIY-style.

Step 1: Set up … Read more

DIY: Give your iPhone a mirrored rear panel

There's not much you can do in the way of customizing your iPhone's hardware. Unless you bedazzle it with Swarovski crystals, apply a GelaSkin, or give it a funky case, your iPhone will continue to stand undistinguished among its cookie-cutter siblings.

iFixit, a Web site that offers tools and parts to allow owners to repair, mod, and upgrade their iPhones, has another option for customizing your iPhone: unique rear panels.

After seeing iFixit's mirrored rear panel, I knew I had to have it. No, it's not a vanity thing -- I'm just tired of firing up the front-facing camera or squinting into the black rear-panel just to see if there's something stuck in my teeth.… Read more

Build a ring light for less than $20

A resourceful videographer, Parker Maimbourg, has managed to build a continuous ring light for just $20.

The setup consists of a cheap, circular LED lamp ($10), an AA battery holder ($1.99), and an unused hotshoe salvaged from an old flash unit. A continuous ring light is typically used to provide even illumination for portraits and closeups and usually costs at least a few hundred dollars.

Basically, Maimbourg rewired all the LEDs on the lamp to a separate battery holder, which will be mounted on the camera's hotshoe. Next, he cut a hole through the center of the circular lamp enclosure to fit his lens, spray-painted the whole setup black for that professional feel, and voila! … Read more

Fun with lasers: Try popping 100 balloons

There are many ways I can think of to have fun with a laser, especially one described as "the world's brightest laser you can legally own." Popping balloons isn't one of them, but YouTube tinkerer WorldScott's stunt is interesting anyway.

In a bid for a record, he lined up 100 red balloons in front of a Spyder III Krypton and fired away.

As seen in the vid below, it took a while for the 750-1,000mW laser, fired through a focusing lens, to pop each balloon, but it eventually did the trick.

The green beam left a trail of red balloon fragments in its wake. Fortunately it wasn't powerful enough to penetrate the far wall. … Read more

Got a deck? Solar panels now a plug-in appliance

It's a green-energy geek's dream do-it-yourself project: attach a few solar panels to your deck and watch your electric bills go down. Now one company is selling such a product.

SpinRay Energy has developed a system that lets consumers install up to five solar panels on their decks and plug them into an outdoor power outlet. People can install one panel at a time, and get up to 1,000 watts of power with five installed.

The main electrical components of the system have the UL safety certification, including the solar panel and the microinverter, which converts direct … Read more

Get smart: Charge your phone while walking in this shoe

Love walking and texting? Still haven't done a faceplant on a streetlight? Well, this sneaker from Kenya can power your phone so you'll never have to look up from that screen again.

Inventor Anthony Mutua, 24, has been showing off his recharging sneaker at the first-ever Kenyan Science Technology and Innovation Week, held in Nairobi. It's another way of using your body's own energy to fuel electronics.

The shoe apparently has a very thin "crystal chip," perhaps a piezoelectric device, that generates power when the sole bends. It can charge phones via a long cable to a pocket while the user walks, or store power for later charging. … Read more

AT-AT computer walks on the wild side

One could safely say Dutch computer modder Sander van der Velden adores the behemoth AT-AT vehicle from "The Empire Strikes Back." The self-confessed sci-fi addict recently stuffed a water-cooled computer inside a large Hasbro toy version of Star Wars' most infamous four-legged Rebel annihilator.

The AT-AT computer measures 2 feet tall (plus several more inches for the dock), and contains some spicy hardware, including a Zotac Z68-ITX (Mini-ITX) motherboard running an Intel Core i7 2600k processor, SSD, and built-in Wi-Fi. The water-cooling system (radiator and XSPC pump) uses water blocks to cool the CPU, GPU, and other components.

The designers at Hasbro probably didn't expect someone to take the largest action figure AT-AT ever made and fit a bunch of computer parts into it. … Read more

As steampunk Nerf guns go, the Goliathon is, well, awesome

"What happens when you weaponize all the horsepower of a full-size steam locomotive?" asks Professor T. Lemetry. "You get the Goliathon. One shot can level a building, down an airship, or turn a man inside out."

I bet it can take down Morlocks, too.

In any case, this is how the Nerf Vulcan should have been designed. Not out of cheap plastic, but awesome copper and brass.

Meet the Goliathon, a heavily modified Vulcan from Etsy vendor T. Lemetry. It's two and a half feet of steampunky goodness. … Read more

DIY: The string tripod (aka stringpod)

Three-legged tripods are the go-to accessory for steadying shots. Whether you're trying to achieve a high exposure or need to work with a shaky hand, propping your camera on a tripod is crucial to producing a clear image, especially in low light.

Thing is, tripods are bulky, making it difficult to carry them while you travel. So, how do you get steady shots without a tripod? With the stringpod, of course.

An old photographer's trick, the stringpod isn't exactly a tripod replacement, but it gets pretty close when you need to steady your camera in a pinch. Here's how it works:… Read more