Hack to the Future
summary
Strips apart 1980s hardware and rebuilds working demos: an Atari joystick converted to USB via Arduino, a Commodore era plotter driving a 3m drawing machine, and a hacked NES zapper fitted with addressable LEDs, a Teensy plus custom surface‑mount PCB, a vape atomiser smoke module and a laser — three months of work that produces visible beams only with haze. Uses an 11‑watt RGB laser plus galvanometer scanners, an infrared camera to track the gun point, and runs playable Laser Asteroids and Laser Duck Hunt successfully at festivals (viral online).
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chapters (22)
- 0:00Introduction
- 2:14Pixel Pyros and outdoor art
- 5:06Laser Light Synth and retro games
- 7:26Mindfulness Machine and 1980s plotters
- 10:281980s tech and Atari joysticks
- 11:54Commodore PET and early consoles
- 13:01Modern equivalents of 1980s tech
- 13:45Cathode ray tubes and legacy
- 16:22Vector graphics and arcade history
- 19:52Laser technology evolution
- 23:09How lasers create shapes
- 26:29Recreating Asteroids with lasers
- 28:18Live Asteroids with audience
- 31:14Laser Flappy Bird and games
- 33:41Laser safety and emergency stops
- 34:48Nintendo Zapper and Duck Hunt
- 37:23How Zapper gun works
- 39:14Modifying Zapper with a laser
- 41:53Adding smoke machine to laser gun
- 44:49Laser Duck Hunt project response
- 47:24Live demo of Laser Duck Hunt
- 48:30Conclusion
