Technology is evolving faster than ever and as creatives we now have more tools at our fingertips. Often at little or no cost. The internet has revolutionised how we connect, learn, share ideas and  fundamentally, create.

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every so often you encounter a problem that feels obvious in the real world but impossible to prototype on paper, think:

• Testing a hypothesis

• Runing a series of trials

• Simply make something tick or flash. 

That’s where Python entered our studio practice.

It began with a simple challenge: We wanted to build a clock. We could cut wood, shape metal, even assemble LEDs.
But I didn’t know how to drive their timing.
Stuck in the conceptual phase, we finally  jumped down a rabbit hole of YouTube tutorials and Reddit threads until I stumbled on an organisation called SensemakersAMS.

Based here in Amsterdam, SensemakersAMS describes itself as:

“A volunteer-run community that connects people around IoT and AI. Everyone’s welcome—technical or not. We meet on the 1st Wednesday for hands-on sessions at OBA Makerspace (3D printers, laser cutters, Arduino, Raspberry Pi, etc.), on the 3rd Wednesday for talks and networking, and we host ad-hoc workshops and excursions.”

Summoning my courage, I attended my first MeetUp and it felt like discovering Photoshop in art school or plugging FireWire into my first Mac.

Suddenly, we could transfer data, prototype code, and see an LED flicker to life.  -YES after our. first session. It was amazing.

Python became the bridge between my idea and a working prototype.

Today, every tool we create begins its life on paper. it is sketched, shaped, and annotated with its intended functions before becoming a Python blueprint.

Let’s be honest: we make countless mistakes. Debugging and iterating often consume hours (sometimes more time than if we’d simply built the project by hand first). Yet other times, the process propels a project to scales we never thought possible.
AI-powered assistants help keep us on track. Although I never imagined myself a software engineer. i dont even like computers all that much. But Python’s raw versatility lets us translate long-held studio ideas into the digital realm and back out in to a reality and that, for us, is something which can not be ignored.

In this  section Project Python, you’ll find a selection of the tools we’ve built and the projects where we’ve applied them to expand our ideas. We’re always happy to support others on their journey, so if you’d like to learn more, please get in touch.

Remember: code is only the starting line. The real alchemy happens back in the studio mocking up parts in paint, paper, or metal, and bringing those digital experiments into the physical world.