First week summary

25.1.2016

It's monday, the beginning of a brand new work week. Last week was our first week at Fab Lab and it was quite overwhelming at least for some of us. There was a lot to take in and to learn. We started out with getting familiar with the machines that we would be using during our internship. Our first assignment was to make ourselves name tags, so that during open hours the people would be able to ask us things more easily. The name tags would be done with the Epilog laser mini - lasercutter. We started out with getting to know Inkscape, the open source vector graphic program used to make models for the cutting machines. We wanted to make the tags visually identical, but we all made our own designs first so that we learn how to use Inkscape. The design was kept rather simple and clean so that they would be easy to read. We wanted to incorporate our home country in the tags somehow, but found the map or the flag too plain and boring. Then the Moomins kicked in and we all picked our own characters that we thought resembled us. Mine was Little My, Henna chose The Mymblin and Marko's character was Snufkin. 

Once the design was ready, we tested it out. The material we used was MDF. We actually made several test, because me and Henna wanted to engrave our characters, and we needed to find out the perfect settings for the images to come out nicely. Marko on the other hand wanted to cut his character out, so he didn't have to think about engraving too much. Once we were happy with the results we started cutting. Our employer Linda also made suggestion that we could try making inlays, so we cut out the Fab Lab's logo and cut the same shaped pieces out of acrylic in correct colors. On the left you can see the end result without the acrylic inlays. When inserting the acrylic pieces we found out that you should actually make them a little bigger than the pieces cut off from the original design since the laser has to burn or melt away some material while it cuts. The pieces were a little loose, but with a little glue and a back made out of vinyl we managed to get the pieces stay in place. We were really happy with the end result, none of us thought our first attempt with the laser cutter would turn out that nicely. All in all project well done. On the right side you can see the final result, our fabulous name tags finished. During the week we also did a small sticker project and experimented with heat pressing vinyl. You can read more about those projects on our FabWiki pages and links to those you can find on our introductions on the The Interns/Bloggers -page.

We did a couple of small fieldtrips too. On the second day we took a walk and visited the near by school Fjölbrautaskólinn í Breiðholti, the community college of Breiðholt, where the coordinator of our internship Ágústa Gunnarsdóttir works as the coordinator for international affairs, such as internships and so forth. They teach everything from arts and textiles to engineering and woodworks. They have good working premises, especially the woodworking department. The textile department was quite small, but they had designed it well so that everything works. On thursday we drove closer to downtown and visited Námsflokka Reykjavíkur, which is basically an adult education center designed to support the public education system, fill the gaps in it and help people who have fallen behind, between the lines or in other ways have disadvantages considering studying. They also provide courses for teens, in the form of after school workshops. They had very little space to use, but they really had made the most out of it. You wouldn't believe the things they could fit in a tiny class room. In Námsflokka you can do pottery, silver casting, textiles and even wood carving.

Námsflokka silvercasting and
pottery classroom

On thursday we also got our car from SADCars! A small fiercely red Toyota Yaris that makes dolphin sounds inside the car and the exhaust pipe begins to rattle if you keep the car idling. But it makes life so much easier, especially during the weekends when the nearest bus stop is 45 min walk away. The windscreen wipers could be better, since it rains and snows a lot in here, but so far we've managed rather well. The car is so tiny that it's really easy to find a parking place, even in downtown. In the evening the Fab Lab had the second open house for the week. There were a lot more people coming in  and going out than on tuesday so even we managed to get some work. Me and Henna helped with the lasercutter all by ourselves, we were so proud. No Marko needed. The day ended at nine pm, so we all were exhausted when got back to apartment.

During the weekend we did some housecleaning (the house was quite dirty when we arrived, nachos on the floor and so on) and organized our stuff into the wardrobes. We rewarded ourselves with a little ride through a small scenic route that begins right behind our house. The weather wasn't the best possible, but the scenery was still amazing. In the evening we had a small pizza party, since pizza had been on our mind for the whole week for some reason. On sunday we did a little shopping trip to the main shopping street, Laugavegur, and visited some flea markets as well. The weather went crazy on sunday. In the night between saturday and sunday it rained like hell and the winds blew at 20 m/s. While we were shopping, the weather was quite nice and we even saw some sun. But in the evening it started to snow. Everything changed in an hour from almost springlike weather to a scenery that was more like the deepest darkest winter. And it has been snowing in showers ever since. The weather should get a little colder and clearer by the end of next week, if it does, we'll be driving the Golden circle on saturday or sunday, so fingers crossed the weather will be on our side.

-Sirja