A lockbox opens when a magnet is moved across its surface in a programmed pattern, with no visible keyhole or keypad. An 8-by-8 array of 64 magnetic sensors tracks the motion; when the gesture matches the stored pattern, a servo releases the latch.
Creator Stephen Cass found that the sensor area was only about three centimeters square, making it difficult to trace the gesture reliably. He decorated the box with a Celtic knot pattern and used part of it as a disguised positioning guide.
To hide the lock, he made a secret magnetic gesture and then hid the gesture's guide inside decorative knotwork. Opening a box becomes a tiny puzzle.
Auto Perfume Sprayer is a work-in-progress device intended to check a person's odor as they return home. A smell sensor feeds readings to a microcontroller; when the result is classified as 'BAD,' a servo presses a perfume bottle to spray automatically.
Makers BULAT IARKIEV and Yadanar Htay describe the project on ProtoPedia as a way to respond to odors that people may not notice themselves, such as after exercise. The project is currently marked as in development.
Come home and the doorway silently judges your smell, then responds with perfume. That's a rather opinionated welcome.
A treasure chest project called 'Shimachan and the Whistling Pirates' Treasure' uses the pitch and number of whistles to encode Japanese syllables and enter a personal password. The design pairs the opening of a physical chest with lights and sounds. Its maker, @kuchibuekun3, lists Arduino among the hardware and currently marks the project as in development on ProtoPedia.
No key to carry around, but you have to whistle a little tune every time you want to open your treasure chest.
Cafe Phin Composer turns drops of Vietnamese coffee into live-generated music. Sensors beneath the glass detect the vibration of each drop and estimate where it landed among seven positions. AI uses the timing and position to choose notes and chords while generating a song in real time. Brewing takes around five to seven minutes, enough for a track to take shape. The coffee selection also influences the musical style, and the changing drop patterns make each performance different.
The coffee spends its brewing time composing its own soundtrack. You might want to listen before taking the first sip.
Maker Tucker Osman built a working Mactini, a miniature computer originally imagined in a parody of Apple's shrinking products. Its only input is a touch-sensitive pad made with conductive 3D-printing filament. Different press lengths and pauses are recognized as patterns that become letters, punctuation, or commands. The device has a small color screen, salvaged speakers, and software that can play music and video as well as accept text.
A parody of removing too many buttons has become a real computer. Typing on it sounds like performing a tiny percussion solo.
Afterglow is a homemade digital camera that locks its shutter after each photo until the user turns a winding knob. It simulates rolls of 24 exposures, with 12 and 36 also available, and requires rewinding at the end. A red-lit darkroom animation makes each photo appear to develop, while synthetic winding and shutter sounds complete the experience. The photos are actually saved to an SD card and can be transferred to a phone over Wi-Fi. Creator Nickson Kiprotich built it to bring back the ritual of film photography.
Digital photography spent decades removing the hassle of film. This camera uses electronics to lovingly put that hassle back.
Zach Hipps built a water-powered dot-matrix printer on the back of a Onewheel electric board. Eight solenoid valves release timed bursts of water to form letters on the pavement as the board moves. After fixing leaks and adjusting nozzle angles, he successfully printed 'KINDNESS.' Faster riding stretched the letters, so he also tuned the valve timing.
A machine built to leave graffiti, except it writes kind messages in water. The evidence disappears as soon as the pavement dries.
Carlos Reyes built a functional version of Homer Simpson's electric hammer. The 3D-printed prototype moves the hammer back and forth automatically, after design refinements addressing friction, alignment and strength.
A lot of work went into avoiding the work of swinging a hammer.
Strange Inventions Lab made a book of every possible image at a tiny resolution, along with an Image Locator Camera that returns a page number instead of a photograph. The 512-page physical book contains all 512 possible 3×3 black-and-white pixel patterns. The camera reduces a scene to nine pixels and displays the page number for the matching pattern.
It neither saves the photograph nor searches the book. It calculates the page number directly from the pixels. The concept also works at higher resolutions and in color, but complete physical books for those modes have not been made.
Take a photo, receive a page number, and reach for a book. This camera makes a bookshelf part of the photography workflow.
A team including sousci is developing an oversized mechanical finger designed to deliver powerful finger flicks. The project uses a large mechanism to amplify a simple flick.
The work-in-progress device is documented on ProtoPedia and uses components including Arduino hardware and servo motors.
To make a finger flick more powerful, they built an enormous mechanical finger. That's a lot of hardware for a single flick.
An external expansion adds typed and spoken AI conversations to a working 1989 Atari Portfolio while retaining its original keyboard and LCD. The device can also describe camera images and play internet radio.
Maker Davide La Sala uses an ESP32-based external module for networking, audio and camera functions, with the AI accessed online. The language model does not run on the vintage computer itself.
The keyboard and screen are still from 1989, but the machine can answer you with modern AI. It feels like a phone call from the future.
A team taped a funnel to the end of a robot arm in an attempt to make it juggle. Their plan was to throw a ball upward and catch it in the same spot, alternating between two balls. Rather than use a camera to track the balls, they planned to repeat the same throw and catch motion.
Mandy Meindersma and two teammates worked on the idea at a September 2026 hackathon. They report that it was much harder than expected.
At the end of a precision robot arm is a funnel held on with tape. That's an unexpectedly charming meeting of industrial robotics and kitchen hardware.
To hide the lock, he made a secret magnetic gesture and then hid the gesture's guide inside decorative knotwork. Opening a box becomes a tiny puzzle.