DimSumLabs

The very first SolidWorks user group meeting in Hong Kong was held at Dim Sum Labs! Tayseer Almattar gave an introduction into the basics of parametric modelling. He is the author of Learn SolidWorks and other books on the subject. Over free food and drink, we exchanged tips and tricks about SolidWorks and other 3D modelling software.

Our member emeritus, Hamish Coleman – still very active even when he is not in Hong Kong – came back for a quick visit. We welcomed him. Not only we have a great opportunity to hear about the project that he’s been working on for years and used by thousands – n3n (and its predecessor, n2n), but we also heard why he thinks Dim Sum Labs is so great for him and many like him in Hong Kong

See the talk on YouTube here:

With n3n, you can create a virtual…

After a lot of clean up, the space is ready to see some actions. And we did just this past week! Iulian Arcus, our member who just moved from the UK, gave a very interesting talk on storing energy using heat batteries. Our friends at Open Source HK gave a talk on computer vision using SoC computers – Rasperry Pi 5 & Nvidia Jetson. And we managed to get the arcade machine going too!

Did you know other than lithium-ion batteries, we can store energy from the sun as…

On our first HackJam after decluttering and cleanup, we wiped some final bits and pieces.

Alex gave an impromptu presentation about the Sunday visit to the UAS drone expo last weekend in Shenzhen.

What else happened:

• Sadale used his electronics expertise to look into a solution for a better lighting system.
• Nigel set up the label printer he brought. Now it can be reached from the network, the first step in our mission to plaster the space with QR codes.
• We got a new…

We are doing some cleaning up! As always, please consider becoming a member and support Hong Kong’s longest-running hackerspace since 2011.

Thanks to Felix, Gabriel, Neil, and Philip, we made DSL a little better for existing and new members. We figure we need to make the space nice and tidy to attract new members and make it a workable space for hacking. It’s amazing that we’ve stayed in the space for 13 years in a city where real estate transactions are…

We are Hong Kong’s first hackerspace. Since 2011, we provide a space for creative, inquisitive and playful minds to hack the universe.

Like every other space on planet earth where people gather, our hackerspace has struggled to make ends meet during the pandemic. Our membership plummeted. Our income from organising events in the space dried up completely.

Thanks to the generosity of a small number of members, Dim Sum Labs managed to survive. It is amazing that we have managed to keep…

During our weekly HackJam, visitor Iulian gave an impromptu presentation showing us TouchDesigner. Its node based editor is popular to create visuals for VJing in clubs. Iulian generated Perlin noise, then used the bass frequency of a music loop to advance through the noise along the z axis. Next, he showed how to separate an animated banana into RGB channels and make it respond to the audio spectrum. In addition to visuals, TouchDesigner can be used like a modular synthesizer to create…

The presentation started with an introduction to living architecture, the practice of growing houses out of trees. For planning projects, visualization is important. During the second part of the presentation, we looked into SpeedTree, a software for designing trees in 3D. It is primarily used in the gaming and movie industries. We created a simple tree. We also looked at a commercial 3D model of a banyan tree as well as an alternative attempt with more realistic prop roots (pictured). The…

In front of a packed space, Christian started his presentation by highlight a few examples where excessive jargon can make a valuable idea a complete turn-off for the public and investors. A simple methodology was shown on how to present a complex idea to nonspecialists using five tools. The presentation concluded with an exercise where we learned how to apply the tools.

Christian Masset is founder of Peak Communication, a communication skills training agency.

Visiting hacker Cedric presented three open source sensing devices and wearable projects:

• HIVE Tracker: a tiny, low-cost, and scalable device for sub-millimetric 3D positioning
• PolySense: Augmenting Textiles with Electrical Functionality using In-Situ Polymerization
• MetaSense: Integrating Sensing Capabilities into Mechanical Metamaterial.

Alex recorded a drone flythrough. Watch it on: archive.org