Studio711.com – Ben Martens

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Learn Quick With Mike Boyd

One of my favorite new channels on YouTube (where “new” means “I just learned about it) is Learn Quick With Mike Boyd. Mike is a Scottish YouTuber who picks a skill and videos his attempts to learn it. And when I say he learns it, I mean that he works incessantly on the new skill until he hits an impressive milestone. For example, how about riding a wheelie for 50 meters or doing a 5x5x5 Rubik’s Cube in under 10 minutes? I’m plowing through the entire catalog of his YouTube channel.

It’s infectious. Think of all the skills you’ve been impressed by but have never taken the time to learn. The really amazing part of his channel is that it generally only takes me five or six hours to pick up these incredible skills! He goes from zero to impressive in the time it takes to watch a couple movies. I think we’ve all wasted five or six hours in the last month, or maybe even the last week. I can’t help but feel motivated when I watch this stuff.

benmartens October 31, 2017 Links

Best of YouTube

One of my new favorite YouTube channels is from Mike Boyd. He picks an interesting skill and goes all-in until he figures it out. His recent video about stacking dice is a great example:

Destin traveled with his kids to see a US world record domino fall. If you like this video, check out the other behind-the-scenes video that he mentions.

Peter Brown is a magician when it comes to epoxy. In this latest one, he experiments with adding fluorescing pigment to the epoxy. The video starts a big abruptly but just stick with it. The end result is really neat.

benmartens October 24, 2017 Links

ISS Transiting The Eclipse

Destin Sandlin has one of the best YouTube channels in existence: Smarter Every Day. I don’t know how he keeps upping his game, but he has managed to do it again. He found his way onto the perfect tiny little patch of earth where he could watch the eclipse AND see the International Space Station transit across the sun during the eclipse. The math is bonkers. He got a bit lucky because they periodically adjust the height of the space station (it slowly falls to earth) and the last adjustment put the viewing location on some reservation land that is very difficult to get to. It all worked out and he has a great video about it. He wins the eclipse.

benmartens August 24, 2017 Geek

Best Of YouTube

It’s been a while since I’ve done a Best Of YouTube post, but, as usual, a lot of great content has been flowing into my eyeballs. First up this time is from the Flite Test guys. They are doing some full scale flight content in addition to their normal RC content. They went to Oshkosh for the big airshow and posted a good wrap-up video. Fun fact: They talk a lot about Sean Tucker in the beginning. He was the only signed photo I had in my room for much of my childhood.

If you pay attention to video shot with your cell phone or most other consumer cameras, you may have noticed a jello effect where straight lines of things moving quickly through the frame aren’t straight. It’s caused by something called “rolling shutter.” Whether you already know about that or not, this video is still incredible. The special effects do a fantastic job at explaining the subject matter.

Modern Rogue is pumping out good content. Some of it is a bit too long for my tastes, but overall, I’m excited when they put out a new video. They’ve had a couple martial arts/self-defense videos. The latest one is about choking someone quickly. While you’d need to practice to get good at it, it’s not super complicated and it seems pretty easy to remember.

benmartens August 17, 2017 Video

Best Of YouTube

I posted about this one before, but I’m loving “The Q” YouTube channel. He is making loads of interesting stuff out of cardboard and cheap materials. This is an awesome channel for kids of all ages to watch and try at home. The latest video really caught my attention. He makes a digital microscope out of a cheap webcam, a cheap light and some cardboard.

The “This Old House” YouTube channel is kind of hit or miss for me, but their recent video about diagnosing a plumbing problem was pretty enlightening.

And for the third video, let’s stay with This Old House because if you ever need to paint a window, you’re going to want to know about this trick for masking off the glass.

benmartens May 19, 2017 Video

Best Of YouTube

This first video is actually two videos. Sneaky. The one embedded below is a series of physics riddles. Watch it first and think about your answers. Once you feel good about your answers, what this video to see the actual answers. I only got two right (and one was little more than a lucky guess.)

Mark Rober is the world’s most awesome uncle and he’s done it again with an awesome Hot Wheels video. Elijah loves his Hot Wheels track and I want to show this to him, but I don’t think he’ll understand that it’s not totally real. He’ll spend the next month asking me for enough track to fill up our whole house.

And finally, I’ve never thought about how ravioli noodles are made, but now that I’ve seen it done, it seems like it could be a fun project. I’ll add this to the list of things to build if I ever get a lathe.

benmartens May 1, 2017 Links, Video

Best Of YouTube

Destin over at Smarter Every Day posted a great video with a guy who can talk backwards. They test him to see how different activities affect his ability to talk backwards. Destin is also the co-host of a good new podcast called No Dumb Questions.

This next recommendation is really an entire channel: The Q. These videos show how to make some fun machines with common household items. His main materials are cardboard and hot glue. For example, here’s a robotic arm made from simple syringes and cardboard.

How many do think are in Australia herding cattle with a HELICOPTER? 10? Well, according to this article, 10 of them die every year. This looks very effective… and completely crazy.

benmartens April 17, 2017 Links

Best of YouTube

Colin Furze is blowing up YouTube. Almost literally. I recommend that you watch almost all of his videos, but here’s his most recent one. He made a giant fire tornado with fireworks on top to celebrate hitting 4 million subscribers to his channel. Tim, I expect something like this at your next Fourth of July party.

Matt Cremona is an accomplished woodworker, but he’s been spend the past months building a giant bandsaw mill in his back yard. This is a big step up from the chainsaw mill he used before. After cutting some “smaller” logs, he was finally able to load test it with a 53″ cut. The saw didn’t even bog down. If I still lived in Minneapolis I’d be excited to visit Matt and buy some wood from him. It’s probably not economical to drive from Seattle though.

As part of Elijah’s bedtime routine, he gets to watch a few minutes of YouTube. Originally it was usually something like a music video from Caspar Babypants but now he just asks for something and we pull it up. For the past few weeks he has been asking exclusively for Lego videos. That’s how we stumbled across a YouTube user called JANGBRiCKS. He’s a full time YouTuber and he spends his time working on his enormous Lego layout and reviewing new sets that come out. Most of the videos are too long for Elijah’s bedtime, but I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t continued watching them after finishing putting Elijah to sleep.

benmartens March 10, 2017 Links

Best Of YouTube

Bad Lip Reading makes it into the list again with a recap of the NFL for 2017. “My brain is so loud.”

Adam Ruins Everything is apparently a show on TruTV, but there are a bunch of clips on YouTube and that’s how I’ve been watching it. Learn why that electric car might actually be worse for the environment than a regular car and why that lady who sued for hot coffee from McDonald’s isn’t as crazy as you probably think she is.

The White Rabbit Project is on Netflix, not YouTube, but it might tickle your fancy if you liked Mythbusters. Tory, Kari and Grant are back together again and they are sort of testing myths but it’s a little different format. It’s not as good as Mythbusters, but if you liked those three, this is at least a good one to have on in the background while you do other things.

benmartens February 22, 2017 Links

Best of YouTube

Did you know that you can hop on YouTube and get a live stream from the International Space Station? The future is NOW!

Matthias Wandel is an engineering wizard and he recently posted a video showing how to make an air engine out of wood. This one got added to my (very long) project list. I’d love to attempt it some day.

And this last one isn’t a specific video but rather a whole series. For the past few months, Matt Cremona has been building his own enormous bandsaw mill in his back yard. He readily admits that he had very little prior experience and just learned it all from the web as he went. I love that all this information is available! I’ll embed a video showing him operating the finished product, but you can checkout this playlist to see the whole process.

benmartens February 8, 2017 Links