Last year at the joint D-Space/DunLUG meeting I made a brief presentation on one of my research projects – the SPI-Scan system. Several of my first prototypes are currently being used by universities, government agencies, and private consultants domestically and internationally to monitor the ecological health and human impacts on shallow coast environments, especially mariculture farms, coastal developments, and ocean discharges. After receiving feedback I wanted to take the next model ‘to the next level’ and built most of the optical mechanical systems, but the heart of the new system lay in improved electronics and code. Early this year I proposed a group D-Space project to achieve a few goals: 1) build a new system that incorporates open-hardware and open-source code, 2) challenges us as makers with real-world problems to help expand each of our skills, 3) provide much-needed funding to D-Space. The project is big, so all are encouraged to share their talents and get involved in some small part of it! (The presentation .pdf is here, 2 MB). Continue reading “Sediment Profile Imaging (SPI-Scan) Project”