Tinker.it is working on a new collection of prototyping components for Arduino hackers:
TinkerKit is an Arduino-compatible physical computing prototyping toolkit aimed at design professionals.
The interest in physical computing as an area in development within the creative industries has been increasing rapidly. In response to this Tinker.it! is developing the TinkerKit to introduce fast iterative physical computing methodologies to newcomers, and particularly design professionals.
This project is currently under development by Tinker.it! We will mostly be documenting the early stages of prototyping and user research here. This is not yet commercially available.
4 thoughts on “TinkerKit: a physical computing toolkit for designers”
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I’ve been looking around and am wondering is there something more than just Processing and Arduino IDE available for software? What makes it better than soldering a component and a connector to a PCB and a whole row of connectors to a protoshield? The convenience is cool, but why will I choose it over just doing some soldering on my own?
It’s not so much that it’s a universally better solution, but it is a better solution for some people. Arduino and Processing are designed for artists, designers, and hobbyists, and they make a great on-ramp for beginners.
It’s also good because there’s a lot of great libraries. I built a project using an Arduino and a MAX7219 to drive 64 LEDs, and it ended up being simple because Arduino’s Matrix and Sprite libraries let me draw pixels and shapes on the display. I saved a lot of time using Arduino for that.
So whether it’s a better choice for you comes down to what your level of experience is, but also what kind of project you’re doing.