On the newest episode of PROCEPTION Stay, hosted by Hackster PRO Robert Wolff, we took a deep dive into the inventive orbit of Dr. Jon Durant, recognized on-line as Dr. Jon EA — whose journey from enterprise IT architect to beloved maker and YouTuber is nothing wanting inspirational.
Dr. Durant joined us on his birthday (sure, actually), bringing not simply years of technical depth however a gallery of pleasant initiatives that mix engineering prowess with playful invention. His specialty? Making advanced issues really feel inside attain, and reminding us that constructing is meant to be enjoyable.
From architect to maker-educator
After many years in company IT serving to companies view expertise as a strategic asset, not only a value middle, Dr. Durant pivoted towards one thing extra hands-on and community-driven. He launched a sequence of Udemy programs on IT structure, however quickly discovered his actual ardour: embedded techniques, Raspberry Pi, and sharing initiatives on-line to assist others construct and study.
He’s now a full-time content material creator, producing partaking tutorials and quirky tech builds that bridge the hole between severe engineering and weekend tinkering.
Initiatives on show
Throughout the stream, Dr. Durant showcased a number of standout builds:
- Pixel Ring: A 24-LED WS2812 ring animation undertaking powered by Raspberry Pi Pico, easy, glowy enjoyable, excellent for dwell demos.
- The Halloween Cranium: Twin RP2040s behind eerie eye actions utilizing UART and Waveshare shows, all crammed right into a creepy 3D-printed cranium.
- Rex P1: The crown jewel of the stream. Impressed by R2-D2 however purpose-built for autonomy, this charming bot encompasses a distributed microcontroller system, screen-equipped dome, tilt mechanism, and a complete lot of intelligent engineering. It is not simply remote-controlled, it’s a robotic that’s designed to suppose, navigate, and work together (finally).
With future iterations aiming at facial recognition, ROS2-based navigation, and environmental interplay, Rex P1 is greater than a cool bot, it’s a robotics platform in progress.
The human aspect of {hardware}
Some of the refreshing components of the stream was the open dialog in regards to the fable of the “full stack developer,” burnout in solo content material creation, and the significance of group. Dr. Durant’s take? Be sincere about what you recognize, have enjoyable with what you don’t, and convey others alongside for the trip.
He additionally plugged his GitHub Sponsors web page, the place followers and fellow makers can help his work and entry premium content material just like the detailed Rex P1 construct recordsdata.
TL;DR? Go watch it.
In case you missed the livestream, catch the total episode on devEco’s YouTube channel. It’s a joyful mixture of robotics, educating, jokes about robotic Santa, and two makers geeking out over {hardware} prefer it’s 1977.
Whether or not you’re a budding builder or a seasoned embedded dev, you’ll depart impressed, and doubtless enthusiastic about the right way to print your individual pleasant droid.
Or come hang around with us for PROCEPTION after hours within the Hackster.io Discord, and it’s also possible to be part of us within the devEco as effectively! (Apply right here.)
