I visited Carrizo Plain National Monument, a remote valley in California, this past weekend to see the current wildflower show. Unlike last month when I was there, there are now flowers covering the valley

Hello all - it's been awhile since I last posted. Let's get to it. Sitting on my desk for the past month is a small battery powered FM transmitter sold by Straight Talk, the cell phone carrier. The device

Steepshot IPFS IOS Android Web

This bird was surprisingly friendly this morning and let me take this picture. In the background is the Hazard Reef formation, which stretches about a mile down the coast. Steepshot IPFS IOS Android Web

Recently I completed a small project - I created a little X-ray radiation source using a barbecue lighter and a vacuum tube. When you pull the trigger, a short pulse of X-rays is produced inside the tube.

I finally licensed my drone so I can use the photos for "commercial" (Steemit) purposes now. Here's a shot of Harmony Headlands, a state park north of Cayucos, from last week. It's the tail end

Early this morning, the Insight mission launched aboard an Atlas 5 rocket on a trajectory to the planet Mars. This large machine, weighing almost a ton at takeoff, will touch down on the red planet about

About a month ago I discovered that my e-reader (which I use to store textbooks and a few other books that I occasionally read) had been smashed. It had been in my backpack for a week or two without me

In this writeup I'm going to discuss how a spacecraft can go from one orbit to another, and hopefully make it as intuitive as possible. Transferring between two orbital trajectories is done by almost every

Today I'd like to briefly discuss various common types of orbital trajectories that many satellites above your head use to complete their missions. Since a given orbit defines the location and velocity

After several very busy weeks and a Physics GRE, I finally have another article. Today I'd like to discuss the basics of (gravitational) orbits - namely, why they occur at all and how they work. This

Taken in March, near Garnett peak. Steepshot | IPFS | Google Play | IOS

Taken along the Navajo loop trail last week in Bryce Canyon National Park. Most of the snow has melted but the temperature was still in the 30s (F). Steepshot | IPFS | Google Play

This picture shows a steep peak inside Zion National Park with the moon above it. This was taken from a detour off of the canyon overlook trail. The famous Zion tunnel passes through the mountain you see,

Another cheap Bluetooth device teardown today. I recently purchased (at my local dollar store of course) a pink wireless selfie-stick. I don't really take selfies (pretty much just pictures of landscapes

Steepshot | IPFS | Google Play

This is a view from a dune in Montana de Oro state park in central California. The town of Morro Bay can be seen in the distance up the coast. Steepshot | IPFS | Google Play

For some reason my local dollar store had a ton of different types of fitness tracker devices today, all for $1.99. I decided to buy one to see what's inside. One in particular stood out for having Bluetooth,

This picture is of the rocky northern side of Morro Rock, a volcanic plug on the California coast I often visit. The cliffs on the right rise up several hundred feet. The rocks are black because they are

I've finally got another technical post today. My schedule got extremely busy in the last week but it's finally getting better with finals being this week (my courseload was such that the week before finals