As I’ve mentioned on occasion, whenever I return to England to visit my dear old mom, on the last Friday before I return to the USA, we have a bit of a get-together at my brother Andrew’s house.

When I say “we,” I mean a group of my techno-geek and techno-nerd friends, who flock from the four corners of the United Kingdom. They all arrive at Andrew’s house around noon. We spend the day in a sort of “mad scientists show-and-tell” exhibiting our latest and greatest creations.

Around 5:00 p.m., they all wander away to check in at a local hotel, then they share taxis back to Andrew’s place and we spend the evening eating and drinking and telling tall tales of derring-do.

In the morning, we all regroup at a local café for a “Full English” breakfast (bacon, sausage, black pudding, egg, mushrooms, beans, fried potatoes, tea, toast, jam… and then we have the main course), after which they head off home again.

Component art: Map of UK (Click image to see a larger version -- Source: Paul Parry)

The reason I mention this here is that one member of our party is Paul Parry, who owns Bad Dog Designs. Paul has a worldwide clientele for his legendary Nixie tube-based clocks. One of my personal favorites is his Bombe Clock (check out this YouTube video).

I was chatting with Paul a couple of days ago when he introduced me to a new activity he’s recently undertaken—Component Art in the form of artistic renderings implemented by soldering electronic components together.

I was just looking at Paul’s gallery, which includes images of animals, machines, maps (I love the one of the UK), and other stuff. Paul tells me that he also does custom pieces on request, and that companies are coming to him asking for him to give this treatment to their logos.

I love the British science fiction TV series called Doctor Who. This is about a time traveler called the Doctor whose TARDIS can take him and his companions anywhere in space and time. The reason I mention this here is that one of Paul’s pieces is the TARDIS, whose malfunctioning chameleon (camouflage) function has left it looking like a 1960s UK Police Box.

I’m envisioning what this would look like on the wall of my office. It would look awesome! I’ve got to get me one of these! How about you? Are you, like me, tempted to power-up your soldering iron and start creating artworks of your own?