In the digital age, analog film as a photographic medium almost went extinct, and many variants did. We can't make them again, we don't have the technology. But somehow some survived and are actually on the upward trend. Film is a phenomenon, a century-plus-old medium seems to have developed a modern cult following. But it… Continue reading Down the Film Grain Simulation Rabbit Hole for 36Exp
The maker faire is coming back to mare island this year in 2024 and I just realized I forgot to post my previous experience from 2023! Oops! After a considerable hiatus the Bay Area maker faire found a new home on mare island in 2023. It was an amazing first comeback leaning into the stem… Continue reading Maker Faire 2023: A Mare Island Adventure
First, what is an ASIC? An ASIC is an Application Specific Integrated Circuit which basically means that it is an Integrated Circuit on a single piece of silicon and its use is limited to a particular application or function. An example would be an ASIC to process an audio CODEC or run a specific cryptographic… Continue reading Designing My Very Own ASIC with Tiny Tapeout
Hobbyist and low-cost antenna design software have been usually limited to basic theoretical calculations based on ideal EM equations that could be done on the back of the hand. It is only recently that full EM simulation has drifted down to the masses in a semi-affordable way. CENOS Antenna Design software is one of the… Continue reading First Look at CENOS Antenna Design Software
As part of the GNURadio Conference 2021, the Radio Resilience Competition created a custom competition just for the conference. This is similar to the Capture the Flag (CTF) that has been a mainstay of the GRCon. The cool thing about this competition is that it was not just for bragging rites but real prizes! The… Continue reading Radio Resilience Competition at GRCon21
With any successful wireless system, you want to have some theoretical basis that your transmitted information can reach its intended receiver with enough power to be deciphered correctly. This is the basic idea behind a link budget where you compile information about your radio hardware and setup such as transmitter power, receiver sensitivity, antenna gain,… Continue reading Simulating Helium with HotspotRF
In a traditional beamforming application, the goal is to design an antenna whose radiation pattern points in a specific direction instead of just being purely isotropic. This directionality can be used as spatial filtering and is achieved in many different ways. One way is to use a directional antenna, such as a dish whose directionality… Continue reading Adaptive Beamforming with LMS
Diving deeper into antenna design you find really interesting antenna structures based on what parameter you are trying to optimize for. I was looking for antennas that had wide bandwidth and some directionality, to use in conjuncture with my LimeSDR Mini for one of my many projects, that's how I found out about the Vivaldi… Continue reading Vivaldi Antenna Design with MATLAB
The competition, along with its organizers, look to set a new standard in wireless efficiency and durability. This is done by providing a simulated wireless environment and scoring structure that challenges competitors to build resilient and reliable radios. More detailed information can be found on their website. https://radioresilience.com/ The Radio Resilience Competition debuted at the… Continue reading Radio Resilience Competition
