Dutch mechanical engineer flies like a bird with homemade wings (Amazing Video) March 2012

Dutch mechanical engineer Jarno Smeets recently posted a video of his first successful flight with his homemade bird wings.

Smeet's efforts take cloud computing to a (literally) whole new level, as the wings rely on an Android-powered HTC Wildfire S smartphone to process arm acceleration and compute the motor output. The phone is connected to a microcontroller that is, in turn, connected to a Nintendo WiiRemote to measure acceleration and other flight parameters.

According to his project site, Smeets took this project on as part of a lifelong interest in flight. He developed initial 3D visualizations of his bird wing design, then started tinkering with his kiteboard kite and a number of consumer electronics.

Admittedly, this all sounds kind of nuts, but Smeets has documented his work on the wings over an eight-month period.

Jarno Smeets: "We did it! This weekend I flew a 100 meters with my selfbuilt wings. I used a GoPro-camera on my helmet to film the flight". "I have always dreamed about this. But after 8 months of hard work, research and testing it all payed off". Follow the project here: http://www.humanbirdwings.net