How Charlyn Gonda Seamlessly Blends Traditional Crafts with Digital Fabrication
Talented creator Charlyn Gonda describes herself as a “coder by day, maker by night,” but the magic of her creations is seamlessly combining the two using digital fabrication tools, including the Bantam Tools Desktop CNC Milling Machine. She discovered her love of coding years ago when her high school in the Philippines launched a new computer science curriculum. Realizing she had a knack for the concepts, she naturally excelled. Charlyn had also always enjoyed various traditional crafts, such as drawing, painting, and origami. The epiphany came when she discovered the maker community and realized her coding and crafting skills didn’t have to be mutually exclusive. She shares, “Being able to mix and match my skills to turn my ideas into reality has seriously been empowering. The act of making has made me more confident in myself, and each project really gives me a unique sense of fulfillment.”
Her maker journey, like many others, began with 3D printing and learning how to design and modify using Tinkercad. With her creativity ignited, she started dreaming up creations that she lacked the skills and tools for, so she enrolled in a Fusion 360 course through her local makerspace in San Francisco, Humanmade. Learning Fusion 360 opened a world of creative potential for her, and she initially spent a lot of time working with the laser cutter. Eventually, her partner gifted her a Cricut Maker, which, although not a laser cutter, unlocked a lot of possibilities. She then progressed to getting a laser cutter of her own.
The combination of her growing personal digital fabrication tools gave her a taste of rapid iteration. Charlyn notes, “I’ve realized that fast iteration and immediate feedback are key to my creative process. I love using digital fabrication methods in general because they allow me to plan ahead, have an undo button, and keep iterating until the magic button creates the exact thing I wanted to exist in the world.” She’s been on a roll creating a number of really interesting projects, including a stylish geometric LED matrix pendant tutorial, an internet-connected soft robot cat video course, and a series of circuit sculpture jewelry pieces, starting with this neat ring.
Charlyn recently decided to add the Bantam Tools Desktop CNC Milling Machine to her tool arsenal. She had always wanted to get into making her own PCBs, but because immediate feedback is key to her process, the thought of sending a design out to a board house and waiting days or even weeks for it to come back had been a major deterrent. She’d considered getting the original Bantam Tools PCB mill, but says, “When the new Desktop CNC Milling Machine came out, promising to be able to mill PCBs as well as aluminum, brass, and all sorts of materials I haven’t even begun to touch yet, well, I just had to take the (admittedly intimidating) plunge. I think of this as the next frontier of my digital fab skills, and I’m really excited to be on this journey.”
Charlyn is particularly excited about the prospect of being able to create more complex shapes out of solid brass than what she can currently achieve with hand-bending brass wires and strips, as in her Orbit ring.
Though her three ride-or-die tools are still a humble multipurpose scraper, a pair of needle-nose pliers, and a Kotto soldering fume extractor, she adds, “I’ve found that adding a new tool to my arsenal tends to really expand my imagination of what’s possible, so I’m hoping that as I crest the learning curve, I’ll witness a whole new landscape of projects I have yet to discover.” Knowing Charlyn’s background and zest for learning, making, and progressing, we couldn’t be more excited to see how the Bantam Tools Desktop CNC Milling Machine takes her creations to the next level.
At Bantam Tools, we build desktop CNC machines with professional reliability and precision to support world changers and skill builders. For the latest Bantam Tools news, sign up for our newsletter. If you’re interested in adding a Bantam Tools machine to your workflow you can order directly from our online store or request a quote.
