Short craft/project tutorial - mindstorms appropriate?

February 16, 2007 10:07 AM

I have to do a short tutorial website for a course (30 min/10 pages) with a physical object (no software). Is Lego Mindstorms too big/complex to introduce?

ps. I'd ideally like to do something I'd like to learn, but I don't want to get in over my head. I don't know programming, but used to play with Legos a lot. Other recommendations also welcome. (Considering cross-stitch as a second option, so traditional crafts that might be interesting to learn/explore in under $250 in an apartment also ok.)

posted by ejaned8 to Sports, Hobbies, & Recreation (3 answers total)

"Mindstorms" sounds too broad to me, like something you could get sucked into spending hours on just trying to find a good, specific topic to write about.

Crochet is what springs to mind when you say crafts...mostly because I found cross stitch to be painfully annoying (and just painful in the "hi, thumb, I'm needle" sense). Maybe a tutorial for crochet snowflakes? There are already tutorials/patterns out there but snowflakes are something that you can show a lot of variation on, to make yours more unique.
posted by anaelith at 1:05 PM on February 16, 2007

I would do the Legos if I was you. I had to go buy a Mindstorm set sometime back as we needed it to do a specific function at work but that is another story. At any rate, the kit was a bit daunting but once we got the hang of it we found ourselves playing with the toy more and more. They are pretty neat if you learn how to use them. A web site with some video might be pretty cool. Perhaps you could illustrate all the cool things you could have the device do that is somehow functional in a home or office.
posted by bkeene12 at 2:55 PM on February 16, 2007

Lego lends itself nicely to websites, but Mindstorms is not so simple. Lego sculpture, architecture or mosaic are other (of many) possible angles.
posted by magullo at 4:49 PM on February 16, 2007