I had bought an Ikea MICKE Desk awhile back because it was pretty simple, had some good drawer space and more importantly, hidden cable management!

The only downside to this desk was its depth. Unless you used a laptop or something on it, there really wasn’t much space at all.

In order to overcome this, the thinking cap came on and with some inspiration spurred on by this workspace and the whole Ikea Hackers movement. I decided to see what I could do to improve the desk, rather than go out and buy something totally different. (I did look, but didn’t see anything that fit my needs and that was affordable – so might as well make something!)

My idea started off as to use an extra shelf. Raised, so I could place the monitors on it and gain much needed desk space underneath back. I had a LACK wallshelf hanging around so I played around with that first, to get an idea of what would work.

Using some old Manfrotto boxes and the LACK, this is what it looked like:

So all I needed, was some brackets to raise the shelf up..and the shelf it self. Ended up settling on the CAPITA brackets and the EKBY AMUND shelf.

Here was the final result, at a cost of under $65 AUD. Pretty good for more functionality, looks decent as well!

If you’re interested and want to see the progress shots on how it was all put together, check out the flicKR set here.

Interested in peoples thoughts on this! Let me know what you think.

Made a beauty dish! Inspired by the guys over at IShootShows’s – The Best DIY Beauty Dish

47cm Mixing Bowl = $12
8cm Aluminium Pizza Tray = $7
From London and American Supplies in Elizabeth St, Melbourne

Nuts, Bolts, Spraypaint = $20
Dremel cutting wheel kit = $30
From Bunnings Warehouse – All across australia

Speedlight adapter = $30
From eBay!

Some photos that I’ve shot with this thing:

Nikon SB-26 1/2@24mm into silver umbrella, camera left.
Nikon SB-26 1/8@85mm, above camera right.

Playing with some lighting, as you do!

Put together another short video.

Still haven’t painted it, have put speaker grilles on and also put in some LED lights for the top marquee and moves section. These give a nice ambient light if you want to play in the dark at the moment.

Used some Contact for the front of the CP, just to stop sweat and crap soaking into the bare MDF. Contact is the stuff you used to use in school to cover your books and stuff with.

Planning to try vinyl wrap to cover the cab..have to do some testing first and see how it goes. Here’s some updated photos.

Sarah bought me a 24″ Vewlix clone arcade cabinet..since i’m going to Japan on Monday I whacked it together unpainted at the moment..and don’t mind it.

It has a paewang revolution dual PCB, and a few other bits and pieces.

The BACK/Turbo button is linked together as well, saves having another button on the CP.

First game/Test (Excuse the the crappy sped up video..handbrake screwed me on the compression and yeah..oops..cbf redoing it.)

Few pics..

More soon!