Old school games
I had a birthday a while back and very kindly some friends who know me well bought and posted a lovely gift.
LCD baking pans. Basically little cake cases to make the cells that create the numbers on a calculator. Nice eh? I think so too.
It has taken some time but finally I had the opportunity to get a little project going that included some of my favourite elements. Baking, photos and nerdery.
The baking was great fun. I was using a stock box of cake mix from the supermarket. Mostly because it’s easier, creates a smooth cake mix and leaves part of my addled brain free to think about the rest. Quantities were the initial problem, clearly I don’t need to fill the cases to near the top as the cake mix rises well. As they rise, they make a rounded top – tasty but not great as I needed them to lie flat in order to create the numbers. Timing was also a bit fluid as they cases have instructions for microwave baking (which is against my kitchen religion). I’m accustomed to baking freestyle – so I simply used sense of smell (yummy!), keeping an eye on the cakes and a clean knife to check when they were done. They don’t take long to bake.
Once baked and cooled I let the cakes rest (time to do the washing up!) Then used a sharp knife to level the cakes into nice flat shapes and take some photos. As you probably know, if you have enough shapes to make an 8 you can make any of the other numbers. The figure 8 is a seven segment display – you need seven bits to make the number.
I had company in the Knight Patisserie too – albeit virtual. Many people dropped into twitter to comment on the twitpics and Flickr images as I uploaded my progress. It’s lovely to have that kind of support and discussion, without of course everyone under my feet in the kitchen 😀
Is that all? No Siree! Anyone who messed about in maths as much as I did, no doubt learned very little (as I did) but, also played games with a calculator. Enter the right numbers, turn the calculator upside down and you can read a word.
I had no idea there is a name for this. Apparently geek slang says it is “Beghilos” – but I have yet to find a source for that. It’s not a bad example as it uses nearly all of the numbers 0-9 apart from 2. If you do know the origin of the word – please let me know.
So – cake numbers became cake number photos. Then I found a resource which lists 250 calculator words and I was ready to go. I had a little chart to help me work things out in photoshop. Each of my numbers was in an image 200×300 pixels and this helped me work out how big to make a new file to drop each one in to make a word.
Here are some examples….
So from being distracted in a classroom decades ago, to loving making cakes, a birthday present from people who know me well though miles away and a few funny words made of numbers on a red breadboard. It’s funny how things come around.
Thanks to Colleen and Tony who sent me this marvellous kit and who are also celebrating their 6th wedding anniversary this weekend. Hugs to you both!
– JK
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One Response to “Old school games”
[…] a follow up to the LCD cakes, this is my second attempt to create some cross over between the nerdy and the tasty. Although you […]