To finish up my B.S. in Computer Engineering, I had to come up with a design project. I had always wanted to create a robotic arm and control it with a joystick or something. I had also recently been playing around with the open source 3D program, Blender 2.49 (this does not work in Blender 2.5+).  After realizing the potential of Blender’s built in Python scripting capa­bilities, I figured why not let Blender control it! Blender can use the full Python installation, Python can send data out the USB port, and there is dozens of ways to control a motor from a microprocessor. I figured I could use Blender to create a 3D model of the robotic arm, control the arm inside of Blender, and have the physical arm stay in sync.
So I did!