More Imagining

Earlier in the year we did some upgrading work on NMS' gallery 'Imagine'. Before the year was out, there were a few other things to be added and some more shapes to play with!

If you're looking for somewhere to take small people during the holiday season, the Imagine gallery is refreshed and ready to go... Have Fun!

Floating in Selfridges

The end of the year has seen some great projects like this one - we were contacted by a great Creative Partnership from London called Isabel and Helen who were putting together some shop-front displays for Selfridges called 'Millions + Billions'. On this project, we were simply supplying the electronics to make the small Earth model hover - you can see more of the project here.

A World of Makers

The last few weeks have seen FifeX make a link with Makeworks who are tracking and logging a list of all of Scotland's designers and makers. We are pleased to be on the list and have been profiled for their website. If you want a look at what we do with some footage of us all at work, have a look at our profile here.

The picture on the right was taken just before they left and shows us outside our unit.

Going Surgical

September saw the re-opening of the Royal College of Surgeons Museum, Surgeons' Hall in Edinburgh. FifeX worked on three small interactives, a rib expander, a laparoscopy exhibit and a trick knot-tying game. The exhibition as a whole is looking fantastic and is definitely worth a visit. More to follow on the exhibits on our portfolio pages...

Voice Visualisation

Over the years, FifeX has built various things for the Edinburgh International Science Festival. Earlier in August, they asked us to produce a Voice Visualiser for a show they were developing - a laser is reflected from a drum skin and takes on some incredible shapes. On the right, you can see the ply and aluminium design that we came up with - all the elements were produced in-house and the entire project was completed within two weeks. Keep your eye out for it, it's a great idea and a lot of fun to use!

Designing our first car...

The last few months have been crazy busy at FifeX and one of the projects we've been working on is for a company in Dundee called Johnson Matthey Battery Systems - they design batteries for many purposes including cars. 

As part of a new exhibition stand they were developing they asked FifeX to design a custom interactive media booth which should be topped with a model car showing where all their technology can be included in a car.

FifeX produced a 3D mould from which the clear acrylic cast on the right was taken - the orange components set into the car were 3D printed as were the chassis and the wheels.

The whole stand looks fantastic and is currently being shipped to the exhibition. Hopefully we'll have more pictures to follow - watch this space!

Melting Glaciers in London

May and June have been really busy for the FifeX team and hopefully we'll have more pictures of a few projects for this news feed.

The final project we completed last week was a set of two exhibits for a team from the University of Sheffield whose stand at the Royal Society Summer Exhibition is entitled 'Vanishing Glaciers'.

The simple units were designed in ply to be flat-pack assembled by the client in situ - this makes them very portable. On this particular unit, visitors can monitor and track how fast the block of ice melts and it will be quite frightening in the heat this week!

Good luck to the team and all the other exhibitors from around the UK - the event will, as always be fantastic and if you're in London, you should pop along!
See more about the RS Summer Exhibition

Get Energised

Last year we produced a few 3D printed parts for the Get Energised project run by NMS in their Rural Life Museum and in Edinburgh. The workshops are designed to encourage people to experiment and investigate with some energy-based science experiments. The project is a huge success and is driving some parts of the new fit-out of NMS itself. On the right you can see some of the moving parts of the models - made entirely on the 3D printer (except for the steel bar!).

Marvellous Materials

We wanted to post a photo of some of the materials we've been using over the last few weeks that are just a wee bit unusual.

Top left there is 3D printed wood which we've used in a few places now - here we have some castle pieces for NMS. Top right is some solid coloured mdf which has been laser cut into shape. Bottom left we have moulded silicone, moulded into some pretty nice shapes and colours and then finally we have a demo from our newest 3D printer which prints in two colours - purple & white is the new orange & white when it comes to traffic cones!

The Best of Scotland's Museums

The first few months of this year have been crazy and FifeX has been doing lots of work in some of Scotland's finest museums. The month saw a variety activities from finishing our project for the Sanday Heritage Centre (Sanday, Orkney) through to an exciting refurbishment of the Imagine gallery in NMS. (photo on right is Ken and Paul during an early-morning start under the yellow glow of the Imagine gallery's lighting).

Finally, to cap it off we attended the Scottish Museums Federation's annual conference in Perth to talk to them about interactive exhibits with Lyndsey Clark. The SMF has members from many of Scotland's exciting museums and it looks like there is plenty to see for Scotland's visitors this summer!

Careers In Science

The FifeX blog posts have been in short supply recently. The lead up to Christmas and January were incredibly busy while FifeX was working on a really exciting project for a company in Warrington called Cogent.

The exhibition we produced is designed to educate people about STEM and encourage people to think about a career in a STEM based subject. There are a number of fun elements to the exhibition including a large-scale periodic table, from which users can pick elements to answer some important questions.

The exhibition will be on show all round the country and in particular at events like the 'Big Bang Fair'.

If you're looking for the next step in your career, check it out and some of the other fantastic resources that Cogent produce.