Travels and Makes
The joys of making on the road
It feels like it’s been a long winter, cold grey days and a kind of gloomy darkness setting the tone. I’ve had my head down for the past couple of months, finishing projects for Brother International and Go On Make Me, and wrapped them up just in time to hop on a three‑week Interrail trip around the Netherlands. As the miles rolled by and my head finally cleared, the creative urge crept back in, that familiar need to explore and make new things.
Travelling has a way of loosening the knots, doesn’t it? Long train rides, quiet compartments, and unfamiliar streets seem to shake ideas loose. I’ve been sketching in cafés, cutting tiny prototypes at apartment tables, and testing little mechanisms made from scraps and offcuts. And with good company beside me, someone to share the small discoveries, the odd cafés, the “look at this” moments, the whole process feels even more alive.
Travelling out of a rucksack means I don’t have my full workshop with me. No camera, just my phone, no printer, though I do have my small laptop and a pencil case stuffed with pens, pencils, scissors, and various other bits and pieces. Sometimes those limitations, the pared‑back tools, the scarcity of materials, can create exactly the right kind of creative tension. I’d had an idea for a flapping‑wing mechanism that I’d sketched on the train to Alkmaar, our first stop in the Netherlands. And really, what better material than a pair of train tickets to build the first model from.
I cut out the various “bones” from the train‑ticket card and set about joining them with small split pins. These ones are 4.5 mm in diameter with 8 mm legs, tiny but perfect for this sort of thing. I’d bought a pack on eBay before the start of our trip, though I’ve seen the same kind in craft and hobby shops too.
As is so often the case, things went off in a different direction. What I’d imagined the movement would be was nothing like what actually appeared in the cardboard version. The result was this rather strange thing, almost like a lopsided beak. But there was something about the action of it that I really liked, so I made a small phone video with the help of my travel companion and posted it to my Instagram.
I liked the crossed‑over bones in the main part of the four‑bar linkage and kept playing around with it, eventually ending up with these two little animations, a pecking bird and a dancing character. I reckon there’s more to come from this layout of parts.
We’ve been out on the train again today so you can expect some more of these quick mechanisms soon.
While we’re away, the column I write for Automata Magazine comes due, so it’s always ticking away at the back of my mind. My chosen subject for the upcoming issue is mechanisms that work by sliding a sleeve along a square‑section tube. I’ve got a few projects lined up to talk about, the paper umbrella on my site, plus some moving flowers and butterflies I made for Brother. But I wanted a fresh example too, something made on the road, so I’ve turned to this goose project as a freehand paper automaton.
I gathered together whatever materials I could find, the inside‑out box from a pack of Nespresso capsules, a few tourist‑info leaflets printed on heavy paper, a couple of pages from my sketchbook, and set about making the #STEAMjunk goose. It took a couple of evenings, but I reckon it was time well spent. The only problem now is transporting it. It’s delicate, there’s no room in my rucksack, and with ten more days of travel ahead of us I don’t rate its chances of survival. So I think I’ll take plenty of photos and video, then leave it here for the apartment owners. I hope they like it. There’s something satisfying about that too, leaving a small piece of making in the place where it was born. A tiny mechanical footprint. It feels a bit like planting a seed you’ll never see grow, but knowing it might raise a smile or spark a bit of curiosity long after you’ve moved on.
I hope you’ve enjoyed sharing in my travel‑making adventures, and thank you so much for taking the time to read.
Normally at this point in the newsletter there would be a free project for premium members to download and make, but I hope you’ll understand if I skip it this time. It just isn’t practical to turn either the goose or the four‑bar linkages into a proper kit without access to a printer. There’ll be more downloads soon, but in the meantime do have a look through the back catalogue there’s plenty there to try.
If you can, please consider becoming a premium member. It helps me enormously, and if you choose the annual option you’ll also get free access to all the hundreds of projects on my website, www.robives.com.
Best wishes for a creative week ahead.
That was very entertaining to read. Thanks for sharing your thoughts and experiences.