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The Public Laboratory for Open Technology and Science Receives Support for Expanding Civic Science Programs

Dear Grassroots Mappers / Public Laboratory community:

We have some great news to share: the Public Laboratory for Open Technology & Science has just been awarded a Knight News Challenge grant to support citizen-based, grassroots data gathering and research.

We are grateful to be working with all of you and want to let you know that we will be focused on further developing our hardware and software tools, and supporting on-the-ground initiatives.

Cell Phone Spectrophotometer

Alexander Scheeline and Kathleen Kelley at the University of Illinois Department of Chemistry have a cool spectrophotmeter project for cell phones that pre-dates our spectrometer, and their software runs on Android.

Arthur W. Mears Kite Balloon, archetype for Kingfisher, Skystar?

Again, from the Yahoo kite patents group comes a balloon similar to the Kingfisher, sold by Southern Balloon Works and the Skystar 300, by Aeronautics systems.

This creepy surveillance video from Skystar shows their system in action:

Kite Balloon of R.H. Upson

For reasons of pedigree I'm optimistic about the functionality of this design and want to try building a scaled down replica out of mylar sleeping bags. The crucial features that I want to integrate are 1) the use (I think) of a Picavet style rigging to hang the payload, and 2) the use of two side-by-side envelopes.

Picavet PET rig

A Picavet rig is a very common type of KAP/BAP rig, I've added it to the juice bottle in a fairly simple way, using 1/2" key rings.

Picavet Juice bottle

lead in brass snap swivels

Our balloon kit is nearly together but one thing has been vexing me-- trying to find a lead-free snap swivel. I like coast lock snap swivels, like the ones sold at kitebuilder.com where I got my first coast lock snap swivel. I tracked back this swivel to the Sampo company, manufacturer of Rosco swivels.

Efficient Image Sorting with Finder & Preview (Mac)

I've made an instructional video on efficient image sorting with Preview and Finder, for quickly winnowing down big groups of images to small sets, ready for MapKnitter:

using a knot to trigger cameras

This is for use with the PET Bottle Rig

Instead of using a balled up piece of tape, a pebble, or some other thing to hold down my camera's shutter, I've gone to using a knot. This makes it easy to hold in place, and makes setting it easier. I prefer a rubber band, but tape also holds it down. tape may be more useful for bulging, non rectangular cameras.

Pearl District - Tanner Springs - Portland, Oregon

Order a print of this map.

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License: 
Public Domain
Ground resolution: 
4.33 cm/px
Bounding box: 
POINT(-122.684923605 45.5294265239)
POINT(-122.678669729 45.5342418664)
Capture date: 
August 17, 2011
Publication date: 
January 27, 2012
Mappers: 
Zach Denfeld
Stewart Long
Cartographer: 
Stewart Long

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