What the Road Shipped

— 2026

Building a Home on Wheels

Two weeks turning an ex-accessibility van into a bedroom, office and kitchen. Solar, Starlink, a swivel seat, a butane oven, and the two boss fights nobody warns you about, namely American banking and van insurance on a visitor visa.

— 2022

Macbook Air 2020 USB C port replacement

Replacing the faulty USB-C port of a 2020 MacBook Air (Intel)

— 2020

Two Wrecks, One Free Motorcycle

A field guide to having expensive fun with no money, worked through on the example of ending up with a road-legal 250 that cost nothing. Two auction wrecks, an engine crane doing a job it was never sold for, and a receipt that came out even.

— 2018

The Sandbox That Draws Its Own Contours

A short-throw projector and a depth camera turn a box of sand into a live topographic map. Built for Te Papa during the Mahuki accelerator, out of timber from my weekend job at PlaceMakers.

— 2017

Engraved Acrylic LED Light accessory

Scavenging spare components from the MagicMirror project to build something cool!

Integrating speakers into a Motorcycle Helmet

Bringing the music inside the helmet.

Final Touches

The Mirror is finally ready. A satisfying end to one of the most interesting projects to date.

— 2016

Building the Hardware

After getting the software side of things up and running, it is time to build the hardware, the cost-efficient way.

Creating Custom Modules

Time to turn specific requirements into reality by writing custom modules.

Idea and Inspiration

A six-month bed rest after ACL surgery in 2016 created the unexpected opportunity to start building things. After days of browsing DIY projects on Pinterest, the Magic Mirror project emerged as the first step toward something that felt like real-world Augmented Reality.

Ambilight

Ambilight, short for "ambient lighting", is originally a lighting system for televisions developed by Philips, however today it is used in reference to all types and brands of ambient lighting in the context where lighting is utilized to complement the light coming from your main display.

Building a shelf instead of cleaning the table

The table is always a mess, full of electronics. Tidying up is not fun, so a shelf was built instead.