A tiny train, a mo-cap kestrel, and good graffiti!

19th August 2024

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Hello! And after last week's long discursions, this week's newsletter is just a quick list of good stuff I've found on the internet.

First up, the regular podcast shoutout: it's the return of the Answer in Progress crew over on this week's Lateral! Sabrina Cruz, Melissa Fernandes and Taha Khan face questions about comical connections, little lakes and technical tofu. (Also, while most of the tickets for the Lateral live show in London this October have now sold, there are still a few available!)

Now, what have I found on YouTube:

First: a very pleasing winter weed slashing miniature train!
Uri Tuchman uses a kids' toy, a Spirograph, on a milling machine. What starts as a little "oh, that's a neat idea" video blossoms into a wonderful series of trial-and-error experiments involving laser cutter and a lathe, and the final results are beautiful.
I was reminded of Adrian Gray's best selling single of every decade (2010s - 14,000BC) (strong language), and it remains a brilliant slow-build comedy bit that must have required so much work for so many quick jokes. Also collaborating on this is Archie Henderson aka Jazz Emu, whose song I Would Rather Die (slightly-bloody violence and death, all played for comedy) has been in this newsletter before.

Most of the things I've found this week have been around the rest of the web, though:

Tired of using your own tongue to test 9V batteries?
slow-motion mo-cap kestrel in a wind tunnel! slow-motion mo-cap kestrel in a wind tunnel! slow-motion mo-cap kestrel in a wind tunnel!
Subpixel text encoding: a limited-use font where each letter is only one pixel wide. It's from 2008, so probably won't work well with most modern screens and resolutions, but if your desktop PC is set up just right, this is incredible. (Thanks Will for sending this over!)
The shocking electrical wiring of Japan including a power strip that just has two long slots?! Even after looking up the original Japanese-language product page, I'm still not entirely sure this isn't some elaborate Photoshop prank.

And finally: the new graffiti in Norwich is better than any Banksy.

All the best,

— Tom

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