anchovie's blahg

blog for anchovie.art. PLUR✌️

[anchoviedraws]

blog directory

anchoviedraws: my blog! i post art/design/hobby updates ⬅️u r here

ny000m: moodboard/inspiration archive

meme-scene: shitposting central

[syn4k]

burning text gif maker

heart locket gif maker

minecraft advancement maker

minecraft logo font text generator w/assorted textures and pride flags

windows error message maker (win1.0-win11)

FromSoftware image macro generator (elden ring Noun Verbed text)

image to 3d effect gif

vaporwave image generator

microsoft wordart maker (REALLY annoying to use on mobile)

you're welcome

[anchoviedraws]

making a keyboard, pt. 3

at this point i should mention my ultimate goal is to make a case that's as rugged as the switchplate i designed earlier. however, i'm still waiting on some much-needed training for both the plasma cutter CNC and the bridgeport at my local makerspace. once i feel comfy enough on both i'll be experimenting with some proper metal chassis designs. for now, however, i'm sticking to acrylic. it's cheap, easy to cut, and has a fun look.

i stacked these translucent 3mm plates to be the perfect height to sink some heat-threaded inserts into, which mostly worked. the bottom ends of the inserts poke out slightly (curse you Chinese parts for not being exactly the listed dimensions), but not so much that they cause problems. i covered these plates with a thin dress plate made of white acrylic that i found laying in the scrap bin, hiding the inserts from view when oriented correctly for typing.

the switchplate-PCB assembly is then sandwiched between these plates and some male-to-female standoffs...

and lastly, another dress plate for the bottom. i still need to 3D-print some feet to add angle and grip, but at this point it's ready for the final touches!

[anchoviedraws]

making a keyboard, pt. 2

with the switchplate arriving in the mail, i could finally solder everything together and have a completely functional (albeit barebones) keyboard! i designed this in fusion360 like all my CAD projects, using a basic plate generated from a script as a base and then heavily modifying it to accommodate for the MCU and case mounting points. in future revisions i may pay closer attention to acoustics, but this plate's design was to be simple, affordable, and effective. material is lasercut 1.5mm galvanized steel plate.

soldering the 69 (nice) switches took ~1.5 hours. combine that with the time taken to hot-air solder the SMD components on the PCB brings us to about 3 hours of total build time. not bad! and let's ignore the fact that i soldered the split spacebar switches before inserting stabilizers ;_; an error i fixed in post.

for the switches, i chose Novelkeys cream clickies. In keeping with the goal of this keyboard to be something uniquely suited to my preferences and typing needs, these switches are probably tied for 1st place among my favorite clicky switches. they utilize a plate spring to produce clickiness but manage to feel almost completely linear - quite unique indeed! check out this short video for a great teardown and explanation of the mechanics involved.

it's starting to actually look like a keyboard now! but still a ways to go. more soon :3

[anchoviedraws]

awhile ago i designed these black-backed jackal-print guitar straps for a friend (try saying that 5 times fast). it was a ton of fun, and she just got the latest design in the mail! so exciting to see my art in the real world :D

[anchoviedraws]

making a keyboard, pt. 1

i don't think i've ever written about my keyboard obsession hobby, but input devices have tickled the wanna-be industrial designer in me for about as long as i've been interacting with tech. for now i wanted to give a quick update on what i've been making. a longer write-up will show up in the projects section of my website when it's properly ready.

this is the first PCB i've ever designed, and despite starting over from scratch 6 or 7 times i still found several things i wish i'd done differently when i received it in the mail. but thankfully, the important stuff was done right and they do Actually Work. first try :3

this PCB is compatible with both Alps and MX style switches and is designed around the Raspberry Pi Pico MCU, a brilliantly-capable and (most importantly) affordable chip with tons of GPIO. pads on the backside are compatible with SOD123 SMD diodes.

i dubbed it the "small fry", though in hindsight that name is somewhat ironic because between the size of the modifier keys and the MCU it ended up being pretty large. but size is relative, and in terms of fish this is still a relatively small one ^-^

more to come, so stay tuned!

[anchoviedraws]

personal comic doodle i couldn't get out of my head. pouring one out for all my homies with anxiety.

[anchoviedraws]

idk if I'm brave enough call these welds "good" but they're a helluva lot better than the ones around the muffler, which I later touched up. this spacer finishes off the blast pipe for the tote gote! just need brakes and a throttle return spring and it'll be back in action.

[anchoviedraws]

beefy new coils mounted up with fresh hardware. definitely makes a difference along with fresh plugs and wires, she revs with zero hesitation now (they're already in the car as of writing this).

[anchoviedraws]

this weekend I helped a friend with an ignition coil upgrade on her RX-8 and the mounting bracket was super corroded. many of the threads weren't salvageable and Mazda in their infinite wisdom welded them directly to the bracket rather than using bolts. a quick session with an angle grinder and a hammer punched everything out, then sanded off the rust and hit it with a couple coats of VHT to prevent future corrosion.

for those of you following this feed on Tumblr, this and future automotive posts will all be tagged "garage" for your filtering pleasure.

[anchoviedraws]

might've gotten a bit carried away with this while i'm waiting on the 3d printer ;^^ here's a box cover and insert sheet design inspired by my Tamiya Lotus kit. stay tuned for the real deal

[anchoviedraws]

project update! salt flat racer v2.1

i'm emphasizing print-friendliness and a fun assembly experience this time around. the original 15-piece model was huge, difficult to print, and had a lot of Really Bad Printing Geometry (sharp overhangs, tiny switchbacks, and wide bed-mating surfaces). this was primarily because the entire chassis was only 3 segments.

to correct that mistake, i'm focusing on modularity when it comes to chassis design. this also lets me add detail. for example, these sensor sniffers are a few mm wide each, and the headlight above them has seam lines just 0.2mm deep. by splitting them off from the main body, i can make them separately on a resin printer. in total the v2.0 model has 31 individual pieces - 2 chassis segments, 2 cockpit segments, 4 lights, 1 grille, 1 tail, 2 sensors, 2 mirrors, 2 bumpers, 2 sideskirts, 1 front lip, 4 wheel pods, 4 wheels, and 4 turbofans! here's a sneak peek at some of that:

everything is fastened together using the standard 8x3.8mm pins used previously in the v1.0 model...except for the sideskirts. they're too thin to create slots for unless i learn injection molding and acquire a machine (not happening). i've made their fitment as snug as possible so they'll line up easier. also, the mirrors: those have their pins integrated because they're too smol.

the chassis is cut along the seam lines for the "doors" and b-pillars to reduce the amount of filling and sanding needed during assembly. that being said, i know if i want this to actually Look Good i'll need to sand everything a ton. layer lines from 3d printing do not make for a smooth model.

anywho at this point the model is almost ready for test printing! prototype photos coming soon™️

[anchoviedraws]

project update! salt flat racer v2.0

this is a very early wip, but i wanted to make an update post since it's been a minute or two. some of you may remember a salt flat racer i sketched back in 2021 and later turned into a 3D model. my original intent was to print the model, assemble, and paint. however, after seeing the result translate from CAD into a physical object, it became apparent that some proportions just didn't quite work the way they did on paper/render. the geometry was all wrong! to compound this issue, this was one of my earlier forays into complex CAD modeling, so the model file itself is plagued with terrible practices and poor timeline mgmt. so, i shelved the project indefinitely.

fast-forward to 2024, and i've regained an interest in building physical models. i'm finally starting to put together an old Lotus Tamiya kit i've had since i was a kid (more on that in a later post), and the thought struck me that reviving the salt flat racer project would be a good way to practice painting models. it's also a great excuse to blow the dust off my CAD skillz (or lack thereof). i want to jazz up the Lotus model with some custom fabrication of my own design, put my own personal touch on it, so this is also practice for eventually doing that. like kitbashing, but with fully custom parts instead :3

as you can see, i'm still very early on in the redesign process. don't worry! the big tail and crazy aero aren't going away. i want to maintain a lot of the original sketch's design language while adjusting the proportions and major body lines to be more car and less rocket. i also want to take what i'm learning from playing with a Real Professional Model Kit and modularize the design much more, making for higher quality and easier printing, as well as a more engaging assembly experience.

ik this was a longer post than i tend to make. i thought i'd change how i do things and make more proper blogs like this from time to time. partly cuz it better documents what i've been up to, and partly cuz ironically it's less mental effort for me to be unabridged. i will try to only do posts like this for more involved projects. thanks for sticking around til the end <3

[anchoviedraws]

power and reset buttons wired! was able to re-use the buttons on the OEM daughterboard like i wanted to, via wiring some jumpers directly to them >:3 perhaps not a very elegant solution, but a very effective and simple one!

if ur wondering why one is electrical taped and the other is heat-shrunk, bacon walked in on me halfway through taping and told me they had heat shrink. and i'm too lazy to redo the other one.

remaining steps: test boot, install win10, and see if i can wire the case speaker up to the mobo for boot or alarm purposes.

[anchoviedraws]

scored some cheap used desks so we can finally throw together a lil electronics lab. this will become the dedicated workspace for future keyboard science and fabrication. for now, here's a G3 conversion update :3

i'm waiting on some jumper wires so i can tie the mATX motherboard's power and reset pins to the original Apple daughterboard switches. then it can finally be booted up! i'd love to find a way to re-use the integrated speaker, maybe as a case-open alarm or a boot sound effect.

[anchoviedraws]

manga-style commission for twitch and his Nissan 300ZX. thank you again!

[anchoviedraws]

it's a bird! it's a plane! it's...some kinda shit welds lol. i took a MIG class today and learned a TON. brought along a shitty little exhaust for an upcoming scooter project, patched some holes and stitched on a muffler. good enough for testing :3. looking forward to putting in the hours practicing so i can git gud