The Antikythera Mechanism: a series attempting to recreate the mysterious ancient Greek device. There’s also scholarly interest, of course.

Clash: this is jarring but fun. {via}

Mercedes-Benz Museum: this really gives a sense of the space—though it’s far too rapid to replace a visit—and I look forward to this becoming a thing that happens regularly. {via}

Iceberger: surprisingly satisfying.

Watch real video of Perseverance’s Mars landing: so moving and impressive.

5 to 9 by Dolly Parton: this is such a great commercial. It’s on brand, clever, and inspiring.

Delightful Acapella Versions of Familiar Jingles: this is some acapella that doesn’t annoy me.
[UPDATE: Brand new one today!]

Pee-Wee Park: exquisitely-crafted trailer—seamless to my eye.

Charles Bridge Construction: 3D modeling of how the Charles Bridge in Prague was built from 1357 to 1402. Stunning, eye-opening animation.

Smashed Mouths – All Star Deepfake Smashup: not perfect but pretty darn close. {via}

The Flying Train (1902): this is amazing footage and such an inspiring view of alternative modes of transportation from the past. {via}

[UPDATE: Someone colorized and 60fps’d the footage and it adds in some missing realism.]

Landing on the Melbourne Citadel in Microsoft Flight Simulator: the backstory on this is someone mistakenly entered “212” into OpenStreetMap instead of “2” for the number of stories that a building in Melbourne, Australia had. Apparently, the information in OSM is used to generate maps and landmarks in Microsoft Flight Simulator, which just released a new version, and the monstrosity in this video was the result.

[UPDATE (8/21/2020): And the Washington Monument looks less accurate. Found an article with more examples.]

Vocodes: you can make your own David Attenborough voiceovers for your home movies now! {via}

SpongeBob Anime: wow. I’m not a fan of anime but this is an amazing effort. {via}

How does ‘Hamilton,’ the non stop, hip-hop Broadway sensation tap rap’s master rhymes to blur musical lines?: very neat way to look at the complicated rhyme scheme of Hamilton and its influences.

Unreal Engine 5 Revealed: this is nummy. {via}

Barbie Of All Trades: in a different era, these would just be miniatures or dioramas. Still impressive! {via}

ZoomerBackgrounds: oh, these are perfect!

Engineering Vids: this is likely Just Another Aggregator but it is so compelling to watch.

Project 88: a scene-by-scene, crowdsourced remake of Back to the Future 2 and here’s the result. {via}

Disunited Nations Maps: excellent visualizations from an excellent geopolitical analyst.

Gallium Metal 99.99% Pure 20 Grams: its melting point is 85° so it literally melts in your hand.

SnowCrystals.com: wow, that is one passionate site. The guy literally wrote the book on snowflakes. This is the sort of thing that amazes me about the modern world: specialization is a wondrous thing! {via}

60 fps 4k version of 1896 movie from neural networks: very captivating. He describes the process in the YouTube description and has a colorized version as well.

@royalty_now_: what iconic faces from the past might look like today or in real life. They’re well crafted though obviously suspect.

Rebel Alliance Life Insurance: yes, it’s a BYU sketch show but this is a solid premise and execution.

Grouch: this is well done and funny.

First Ever Life-Size and Drivable LEGO Technic Bugatti Chiron Is a Pioneering Piece of Engineering and Design: very impressive and repairs would be very cheap.

JustWatch: easy way to search for where a movie or TV show can be watched. {via}

Office Classics – Classical Art in Modern Settings: sometimes Reddit is just wonderful.

XM42-M Store: world’s most affordable flamethrower. I’m not sure who the target market is, though.

Main Street Coalition: I sure hope this works because the progressive shareholder activism is aggressive and getting bigger.

The RoboRoach Bundle: I had no idea this was so accessible. Read the ethics statement at the bottom for a laugh—it’s a freaking cockroach.

Arrested Development – Star Wars with Ron Howard: nicely done!

Zack Morris Is Trash: a bad guy on a bad show, but now definitively proven. (It’s also available on Amazon Prime Video, which is where I found it.)

How to build a house alone: doesn’t look too difficult if you know what you’re doing. (I don’t have any idea what I’m doing.)

The Cake Server: holy crap! I am in awe.

Trump vs Talking Heads: very well done.

Deluxe – My Game: simply amazing video by one of my favorite bands.

Paul McCartney Rabbit Hole: not into the Beatles or Sir Paul, but this is exceedingly well done. {via}

Calvin County: I’m not a Calvin and Hobbes fan but I like the meshing of the styles. (Plus: Opus pisses himself.) {via}

How It’s Made – Toilet Paper: mesmerizing. {via}

eGenesis: a George Church company that’s working on growing virus-resistant human organs in pigs. (From an incredible interview he gave on a podcast.)

AirFish 8: like a boat but without all that water drag. I’m amazed that it’s classified as a marine craft rather than an airplane. The corporate video is compelling.

Introducing MARTY, Stanford’s self-driving, electric, drifting DeLorean: mmm, donuts. (More details here.)

Lists of unsolved problems: this is a great survey of what we don’t know. (Or what we know we don’t know.)

Train Buffs Are Traveling Cross-Country in Super Luxe Railcars Hitched to Amtrak Trains: they’re called “varnish” but I’d prefer to call them “rail yachts.” I can’t imagine preferring this over private jets though (and I’m definitely in the “train buff” category).

The Politicization of the FBI: outstanding overview of the situation from a very-experienced source.

Inching closer to a DNA-based file system: this is a fascinating glimpse at the future. The information storage density and self-replication ability of DNA makes it a compelling data storage platform.

The Biggest Opportunity Everyone Is Missing In Self-Driving Cars: hear, hear!

Britain’s Giant Airship: I’ve read his book and it is wonderful. The writing is so compelling.

MetPublications: free digital versions of their publications back to 1964. I found this Frank Lloyd Wright one and another on the sculptor Bernini.

The Fascinating Company That Tears Cars Apart To Find Out Exactly How They’re Built: this is an astounding amount of work. (I found out about this company when they revealed some Tesla Model 3 build issues. On that front, I suspect that the quality issues are due to the rumored hand assembly.)

Ass Is The Most Complicated Word In The English Language: this is absolutely hilarious. {via}

Sprawling Maya network discovered under Guatemala jungle: this was presaged by the events in The Lost City of the Monkey God. Far from being a dead field, archaeology is going to have a boom soon just to deal with excavating the findings from LIDAR.

Family fun with deepfakes: I particularly liked his closing paragraph imagining legitimate uses of the technology. (It’s so easy to think of the evil that can be done: Black Mirror‘s “Shut Up and Dance” episode but without having actually done the initial act.) {via}

Map Showing Where Today’s Countries Would Be Located on Pangea: we’d still be having fights building the wall with Mauritania. {via}

#MeToo and the Taboo Topic of Nature: an informative perspective on the nature of gender. {via}

How McDonald’s Makes Its Fries: that explains why McDonald’s fries are so good and consistent. {via}

Rescue Drone Saves Two Boys from Drowning on Its First Day in Service=: sometimes you just need a good reminder of technology’s utility, especially if you’re a fan of Black Mirror. {via}

Inside One of America’s Last Pencil Factories: these sorts of windows into things you take for granted are wonderful. I could watch Dirty Jobs and How It’s Made all day.

Off the Wall Response to Rebecca Bright: Mike Rowe is an impressive man and Ms. Bright is the quintessential leftist.

Google Maps’s Moat: this is an impressive insight into Google’s mapping efforts. (It’s also impressive in its depth—I’d highly recommend looking at his other essays.)

Hooked On The Past – Exploring the history of architecture: the proprietor recreates demolished buildings digitally, providing a valuable service. The recreation of the Paulson house, for example, is so much more vivid than the elevations I had seen previously.

Pumped for the Future –
Fueling Up at Frank Lloyd Wright’s Visionary Gas Station: I had heard of this project, but had never seen it.

Netflix Genre List: tens of thousands of genres, including Goofy Deep Sea Movies. {via}

Mike Rowe Wears Trump’s Robe, Fights a Drone, and Solves the Labor Shortage: such a compelling person and a wonderful interview.

Your Life in Numbers: gives you a little perspective.

Kitbashed: holy moly this is comprehensive. For just one example, look at this exploration of the Millennium Falcon. There is so much there for the film geek.

Atlas, The Next Generation: wow, but that guy’s a real jerk at 1’30”. Geesh.

Ancient Rome: HBO’s Rome brought ancient Rome to life more, for me. But this is very captivating still. {via}

Space Tourism Posters @NASAJPL: something tells me NASA isn’t the one to get us to this future, but they are beautiful.

OK Go – Upside Down & Inside Out: if only I liked their music.

Frinkiac: wow. This is a very well done Simpsons quote search engine.