Bioshock was a beautiful game. After playing it, I got hooked on the idea of turning its logo into a metal belt buckle. The prototype was milled out of machinst’s wax over on the Tormach 4-axis CNC at Techshop. When I finished molding it in silicone, I had some wax duplicates cast in bronze. You can see more of the prototype on Flickr and view a tutorial of the process on Instructables.

These digitally fabricated steampunk goggles took over a year of tinkering, procrastinating, and experimentation to build. I started with the metal pieces, designing them in Solidworks and cutting out waxes on a CNC milling machine over at Tech Shop SF. From there, parts were cast in bronze at a place called JR Casting. I designed all the leather parts in Illustrator, creating cut-out paper models to test the design as it became more refined. Then all the cut patterns were sent off to Ponoko to get laser cut in leather. After that, it was a couple evenings of dyeing, painting, stitching, and sweating to get everything together. You can see an album featuring progress shots of the goggles coming together here.