• Shop
  • Highlighted
  • commissions
  • Things I do
  • About
  • Ahlan!
Menu

dina Amin

  • Shop
  • Highlighted
  • commissions
  • Things I do
  • About
  • Ahlan!

What's Inside My Pen?

April 21, 2016

Every Friday I pick a random product on Instagram, I disassemble it, examine it and make a stop motion story with its parts. Every week the result is completely different and unexpected.

Here I share how it all comes about!

My lil sister has been doing some career consulting before choosing a university to enroll to and last week she asked me the famous Pen Interview question 'What would you do with a pen other than writing?' And all of a sudden I see this question popping everywhere! Hence...

I have so many pens that are all used up but I wouldn't throw away precious plastic tubes just like that! There must be something I can use them for! I picked up a pen and thought what would I do with just a cylinder and an ink tube! But hey! That's not all! There is also air inside! Air and a tube! Taddaaa! I can make a flute!

With my terrible fish memory, I forgot all the science and physics of sound and I doubted if I can make a real sounding flute! A whistle is definitely doable, I have eaten way too many whistle stemmed lollipops! Can't forget that!

So here is a basic explanation of how flutes are made and the reference that I used to make mine. If you want to check a more complex explanation about the physics of a flute check this video Also here is an interesting video about how snakes move

I chopped and shaped a piece of an old wooden crayon and used it as a dowel inside the main tube; tried to stay within the stationary category! And it worked! I then crossed my fingers and made three tiny note holes along the tube. The last two worked, the first one was a mistake!

And now I am finally ready to take my first steps and start my snake charming career!

My pen flute in action...

A video posted by Dina Amin (@dina.a.amin) on Apr 21, 2016 at 9:58am PDT

That's it for this week! For more of this, follow along on Instagram if you aren't already! And don't forget to subscribe to The Tinker Mail!

In How It Works Tags pen, product, Egypt, waste, snake, upcycled, Stop motion, animation, art, Tinker Friday, cairo
← What's Inside My Compact Fluorescent Lamp?What's Inside My Fake Quartz Watch? →
Tinker Friday

On this blog i'll share all things I do, from offline meet ups to talks and workshops. I'll show you my 'tinker' process; the things I learn about all the products I take apart and what goes on in my brains when I look at the pieces.


Support me on Patreon!

patreon dinaaamin

Hi there!

Tbh I rarely send out emails, but when I do then it’s something big that you don’t wanna miss!

Thank you!

Have something interesting to tell me? Ahlan!