written by Ella, Alex K, Noah, Gabe, Alex MC, Bill, Lexi, Cillian, Sarah & Jac

Today we rode the train up to San Francisco today and then took the #30 bus from the station to the Palace of Fine Arts. We spent the morning at the Exploratorium – the museum of technology, art and perception.

Gabe got to “see” a sound wave using a vacuum tube filled with water. We climbed inside one of the columns supporting a rotunda built for the 1939 World’s Fair and filled the space with low tones that appeared to have volume fluctuations based on where we stood within each waveform. Alex MC spent some time today testing his ability to walk quietly while being judged by a decibel recorder. We interacted with visual illusions, psychophysical experiences, mind games and tactile curiosities.

We walked a mile to Barney’s Gourmet Hamburgers, where we ran into Joe Grand. Joe is one of the stars of Prototype This, Discovery Channel’s awesome engineering and programming show.

“It was really cool when Joe opened his backpack and showed us a bunch of circuit boards that they used on the show” – Gabe

Joe was incredibly generous with his time, and spent a couple of hours with us. He told stories of his time on television, his interests as an engineer, his favorite projects and the DEFCON hacking conference. He entertained our questions about his favorite iPhone apps, OS thoughts, SF landmarks and life as a new dad.

Our afternoon plans were to visit the Golden Gate Bridge, but an overwhelming majority of us wanted more time at the Exploratorium for fun with physics.

Late afternoon we got a call from Mari Malvino, who works for the Giants baseball club. Mari and her boss, Pat Gallagher, invited the digital arts crew to a behind-the-scenes tour of the announcers booth and scoreboard control room. Jim, who works with the scoreboard, gave us an overview and pointed out some of the amazing technology they use. We watched an editor build the presentations that play between innings and saw the sound control guy using iTunes to manage his library. We got to take a pre-game stroll of the club level, where there is tons of great memorabilia.

“It was cool to see the stadium and scoreboard from the controllers point of view.” – Alex K.


At 9pm we were tired, cold, and a little taken-aback by the colorful language some Giants fans use when talking to the other team. We headed to the train and collapsed by 11:20pm. Tomorrow we are off to San Mateo for the grand finale – a full day of Maker Faire! We’re hoping to run into Ani, Adam & Raphael from Thursday and Joe and some Exploratorium folk from today.