(Credit:
Mike Libby)
For insect-phobes, the only thing scarier than a big, hairy tarantula would be a big, hairy tarantula tricked out with brass gears and looking like it had crawled straight out of a sci-fi horror fest. But rest assured, this spider won't bite--or crawl over your face in the middle of the night. Nor will any of Mike Libby's other cybugs.
Libby, a Portland, Maine, artist, customizes real insect specimens with antique watch parts and other technological components, and the results are generally more cool than creepy. He has shown his work around the country, most recently at the Smithsonian Craft Show in Washington, D.C., which ended Sunday.
The artist, who holds a degree in sculpture from the Rhode Island School of Design, says his Insect Lab began after he found a dead, intact beetle. He thought the bug looked and operated like a little mechanical device, and decided to combine the two in a statement about the similarities and contradictions between nature and technology.
Libby works with the range of creepy crawlers--beetles, spiders, butterflies, bees, grasshoppers. When he doesn't find them nearby, he gets his "safe, non-endangered" insects from around the world, including Africa, China, New Guinea, and Brazil.
If you're not too terrified of creatures with antennae and stingers, click through the gallery below to see some of Libby's insect innovations.
(Credit:
Engadget)
Here's the perfect answer to your prankster friend and his RC tarantula or that irritating co-worker who won't stop playing with the toy bug bot or "Solar Cricket" on his desk.
Relish the look on their loaf-of-bread faces when you summon all 44 pounds of the "Halluc II" beast-roach. Developed by Japanese scientists, this 32-inch, eight-legged robotic bug runs on Linux software and an 800MHz AMD processor, technology that Engadget says allows it to "walk or roll via a simple rotation of its jointed appendages." What's unclear to us is why it was created, though we suspect the project leader had an obsession with Kafka.
(Credit:
Technabob)
There's nothing we hate more on the face of the planet than cockroaches--the mere thought of them can send us into a skin-crawling fit. So we think that the geniuses at Bandai Japan who invented the "Hex Bug" should be shot or, better yet, ordered to serve a life sentence in a gigantic Roach Motel.
Just reading Technabob's description of the $16 bug-bots makes us twitch: "The Hex Bug series of miniature insect robots scurry along on six legs, just like real bugs," and will "change direction when you clap in their vicinity." Gross.
As far as we're concerned, we'd rather be attacked by RC tarantulas. At least we know it's possible to destroy those, unlike roaches, with a shotgun.
(Credit:
Hammacher Schlemmer )
We still don't understand the overwhelming popularity of remote-controlled mini-choppers, mosquitos and other annoying flying objects. But if you absolutely must have one, we say go all the way.
The "Four-Motor Remote Control UFO" by Hammacher Schlemmer has a lightweight carbon fiber frame and a "gyro-stabilization system" that allows "precise control through hairpin turns, rolls, pitches, and hovering, in addition to yaw and throttle." And with a 300-foot range and nearly 2 feet in diameter, this UFO will squash those flying insects like, well, bugs.
That is, until the "Flytech Dragonfly" comes on the market. When that happens, you're on your own.
(Credit:
RoboCommunity)
When we started seeing remote-controlled mini-helicopters and mosquito choppers buzz into the market, we kiddingly warned that a locust-like invasion must have been imminent. We're now sorry to say that the joke may be on us.
RoboCommunity is reporting that WowWee--maker of the hugely popular Robosapien--has submitted applications with the FCC for a remote-controlled "FlyTech Dragonfly." Quoting a user manual submitted to the agency, RoboCommunity says the device "has wings (like a dragonfly) and a tail rotor like on many helicopters, and is supposed to be 'crash-proof' due to what they term the 'high-flex' design. The wings are replaceable, it is rechargeable and there are 2 flying modes: beginner and expert." (Submitted photo shown here.)
Given WowWee's successful track record, we could be entering a whole new era of airborne annoyances. But we'll still take them over the flying alarm clocks.
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