Craft Technology Lab, CU Boulder

Welcome to our photographic tour through the Craft Technology Lab at CU Boulder.  The Craft Tech Lab is part of the computer science department, and is run by faculty Mike and Ann Eisenberg, with doctoral students Yingdan Huang, Jane Meyers, and Ben Leduc-Mills.

In the Craft Tech Lab, we work and play in the intersection between computation and real-world crafts. 

Just inside the front door is our MakerBot, with some test output.

We have a number of conventional bench tools, which get heavy use.

Here is a doctoral student's workspace:

Another doctoral student's workspace.  Assorted items pictured include LilyPad Arduino (Leah Buechley built the initial design in this lab as a grad student); arduino; paper flowers; a knifty knitter, just for fun ...

Here is a wide view of the grad student work area side of the lab.  Ben Leduc-Mills' u-cube project is toward the back.  Also in the photo are pieces from Yingdan Huang's Easigami, and Jane Meyers' Craftopolis.

One of the tidier areas of the lab ... an older Catalyst 3D printer, which fabricates in plaster (or starch) with an epoxy binder.  Various electronics above it.

Here's our workhorse machine:  a VersaLaser 300.  We have it hooked up to a nitrogen supply to cut down on some of the burn factor since we cut a lot of wood.

Materials for the VersaLaser and general fabrication.  This storage area contains mostly basswood and acrylic.

This is our Dimension SST 3D Printer.  It has a nice 8x8x8 build space,  and we like to print in various ABS colors (cartridges stacked to the side).  Perched on the top of it is a model of da Vinci's hammer device.

This is the front window and display area of our lab.  The window showcases current work including laser cut mathematical slice forms;  string sculpture that uses laser-cut frames; laser-cut mechanical moving toys; 3D pop-up paper crafts (software-generated); hypergami (software-generated) polyhedral paper sculpture; and a paddle boat fabricated in our first-year engineering projects class that uses both laser cut and 3D-printed mechanisms.