technologyconnections

A tour of the new Headquarters

Well, the important bits anyway (and with a really unsteady camera--handheld work is not my forte).  

Seriously, thank you one and all for making this possible.  There's a good deal of work to do before the basement space is ready for filming, so you can bet that many a weekend will be spent here working on those little details.  And, what I didn't include here, a lot of cleaning.  Goodness this place is filthy in many places.  But I'll make the most of those trips--it...

New video! The Sony Tracking System

This ended up getting split in two (with a sort-of bonus video to come soon, but that will go live for everyone tomorrow) and is definitely my silliest video yet.  And you will very quickly see why.

Captions will take me a little while, and there is a card I need to add later, but otherwise it's ready to go!  Hope you enjoy.

A space has been secured!

Great news!  After some doubts that the deal would fall through, I can presently say that I am now in possession of a completely blank canvas of a space, and am working on getting the new space ready for moving the set to.  I don't want to tell you too much about it yet--there's much work to be done, which partly explains why I rushed the last video.  And I can't show it to you yet because, well, I'm not there right now.

But I will say this--it's a combination of a few plans. &n...

New Video! The LED Printer

I've been working on some significant behind-the-scenes stuff lately (which inadvertently caused the injury to my right hand you might spot).  While it's all good and for the channel, it's definitely in the farther-future category.  I've fallen behind with the next CD video, so I threw this together.

Trying something new putting my face in the thumbnail.  This was essentially one of the auto-thumbnails with some text added for that clickbaity goodness (the title is dangerously c...

SUPER Early Access: A Tale of 2 CD players

First of all, that ^^ is the auto-generated thumbnail and it's perfect.  I love it.

This video will be a supplement to the upcoming video, so it sort of contains mild spoilers (but about very small things).  Mostly this is just a discussion about some strange differences between two incredibly similar Sony CD changers from the early 1990's.

UNCONTAINED EXCITEMENT (a thank you!)

Wow.  Wow wow wow wow wow.  (and flutter!)

So I couldn't just not do anything after having reached the biggest goal I had set!  Thank you to everyone who has helped get this channel to where it is!  This video is more thanks as well as some musing about the future.  It's very laid back, and just me talking to you, but really...

Thank you!

Here's to the future!

(and maybe I'll update the goal--but right now, the possibi...

CD Players: Dissected

Well, here it be!  Delayed one day due to a lack of motivation yesterday, but now it's up.  It's still processing so as of this writing it's a little blurry.

Captions are coming soon.  This time I added a card straight away because, well you'll see.

Next video coming soon--but there are headaches

I backed myself into a corner here, I'm afraid.  Things in this edit are far more tedious than usual.  Don't you just hate it when you envision a thing as simple, but then when you go to do it you want to bash your head in?

I had hoped to have this video completed last night, as my next few days are a little tied up with other needs.  I'm only about halfway through the timeline!  Likely another 8-10 hours of work left on this one.

Anyway, just throwing out an update f...

The Compact Disc: An Introduction

Up real late to post this, so the busywork portion will have to wait.

Let me know what you think of the end.  The song, "Floaters" has been used many times by me because it's what I would describe as aggressively smooth, and a little hilarious.  It's been my unofficial theme song so I'm thinking of making it more or less official.

This will probably go live on Monday, though I might post it on Sunday depending on how things seem to be going.

Setception

I'm currently shooting B-Roll, so I have both my desktop and laptop casting to the displays, and I forgot I had Premiere up so this happened.

Just throwing this out there...

In my last behind the scenes video, I had forgotten to turn off monetization at first.  For stuff that only Patrons can see, I try to turn off ads since there's no reason to keep them on there.

That said, when I upload a video for general consumption (that sounds weird but it will have to do), I leave monetization on because I want to be sure that the algorithm doesn't catch it.

It seems that lately the algorithm has indeed been improving.  It's been a long time since any of my...

New Video! The GFCI/RCD

Taking a brief interruption from digital sound to bring you this.  From a Twitter poll, apparently more than half of "people" don't know what these do and why they're important.  I've always found them to be really neat, so I figured a video on them might be a good idea.

Pretty soon I'm gonna need a true outtro for all of the $10 patrons!  Wow!  I split you up into 2 columns today because my ending remarks were a little short.  It scrolled really really fast otherwise!...

Behind the Scenes! A look at the making of my latest video

Making something like this has been long overdue.  Hopefully you find it enjoyable--fair warning, it's on the longer side!

New Video! Nyquist-Shannon (digital sound part 2)

Thanks for your patience these last weeks as I worked through some deadlines.  Enjoy the continuation of the Digital Sound subject!  Please tell me if there's something I explained weirdly.  I think I've contextualized this all now but ya never know...

(forgot to add:) Captions, cards, and the end-screen are coming soon, as per usual.  Those take a while and I like to get this up for you ASAP

Unplugging until Friday 8/3

Hello everyone,

Although I sort of alluded to this with my last video post, I wanted to just put this here so that you're in the loop.

Due to some non-YouTube projects I have coming due, I'll be going on a social media hiatus for the next week.  I need to promise myself that I'll actually do this, but I can't bring myself to do so without letting you know.

I'll be back in action this Friday and then I want to share with you some future plans.  So stay tuned for an announc...

New video! The rise of Digital Sound

Remember how I started this channel and never finished the story arc of sound reproduction?  Time to fix that.

As a note of future concern: you may have noticed that my upload "schedule" has been very, um, unschedule-like.  My target has been three videos a month at least, and with this video I've now reached it for July.  For the next week, I'm pretty much unable to do any of the YouTube business due to other stupid real-life deadlines that I need to focus on, so although you m...

Behind the scenes! An air conditioning adventure

No, this isn't about my planned video on Air Conditioning, though the purchase here will be a very helpful aid for when it comes time to make that one!

This is just a video about a thing that you helped buy which has solved a big problem of mine, and which I think should be a more widely-produced product category.

A thing of context I didn't reveal!

Why do I have two portable A/C units?  Because Costco appeared to be taking their sweet time shipping my order.  ...

New Video! The Senseless Ambiguity of American Turn Signals

This video came together well EXCEPT for the audio, which really wasn't great.  Boo.  That's why I am continuing to to experiments on sound equipment.  But for now, I hope you enjoy this!

I'm going to be pretty bust most of today, so a better thumbnail and all that jazz is on the way!

Thank you

A little something came in the mail, and I have YOU to thank for it.  Without the support of amazing people like yourself, I am certain this would never have arrived on my doorstep.

I'm working on a video right now inspired by a Twitter conversation, and I hope to have it up by tomorrow afternoon (tonight if I'm lucky).

Thanks for making this amazing journey possible!

--Alec

New Video! Betamovie

This was one of the most fun videos I've made.  You'll probably notice a new toy in use throughout for B-roll.  And I spent a lot of time keyframing for some animations that I hope help illustrate what's so clever/weird/ingenious about Betamovie.

And it's up

This was hashed out quickly, so it's mostly a talking head.  That said, I think it's important.

I'm about to make an unplanned video

So, Jason of Engineering Explained released a video today about EVs and the future of transportation, and he made a point about charging infrastructure that is commonly made but is fundamentally false.  So I'm going to be hashing out a quick video to address this.  I will post it here when finished, but I'm not going to hold it for uploading because I want it out ASAP.

Thanks!

New Video! The Stretching Rooms of the Haunted Mansion

Well, I might as well have made something out of the trip to CA!  I'm not sure how widely known this fact is outside of Disney enthusiasts.  I'm hoping you find it fascinating!

(cards, endscreen, and captions coming soon!)

A TC 2 video (going live now)

I made a quick thing for the second channel.  This is really just a ramble about autofocus and nighttime, as well as a little bit of trivia regarding Chicago airports.  

New Video! The conclusion to the HPS lamp

There was a lot more to unpack from this topic than I realized, and it actually changed my mind regarding the use of LEDs in roadway lights.  I had originally thought that sodium lighting was good enough, but after reading the research and re-evaluating the areas near me that had been switched over, I think the direction we're headed makes sense.

Update (as I plan poorly apparently)

So, if you aren't a Twitter person, you may not know that I just got back from a short jaunt to California.  My mom and I flew out in a moment of serendipity as we were able to meet my brother for a couple of days.  Anyway, as nice as that trip was, it really threw off my groove!  Especially since I volunteered to help out for two more shifts at work since we're having trouble finding my replacement.  *sigh*

I'm nearly finished writing my next episode on outdoor lighting wh...

New Video! The High Pressure Sodium Light

Well now, here it is!  I have a fondness for this sort of lighting, mostly because of its method of operation which is nuanced and fascinating.  This video explores it a little bit, and in my next video we'll look at why they are being replaced, and how this is both good and bad.  To be clear, it's mostly good, but there are some clear caveats.

Early Access for All Going Forward!

I've decided to make a change to the reward tiers and give everyone early access to my videos.  The more people who have access to them before they go public, the better I can gauge how the video is received.  Your feedback has proven helpful time and again with pointing out errors and just general input.  I decided I'm hurting myself by limiting this.

$5+ patrons are still getting the description shout-out, and I will be working harder to make behind-the-scenes stuff for you. &...

Pioneer LD-W1 eBay Mishap

The audio is really bad in this video.  I used my old phone for this which has a better video camera but apparently the sound is messed up.

This video will stay for Patrons only and it's very possible I'll never make a video with this machine, but this is a Pioneer LD-W1, a very unique Laserdisc player that can play 2 discs uninterrupted.  It is a very collectible machine due to this feature, as well as its use of an 8-bit frame store for trick-play features on CLV discs.  Howev...

Early for All! The Chevy Bolt summer range test

I hadn't planned on making this video so soon or so quickly, but we got quite the heatwave recently in Chicago (and we're still in it for another day), and it worked out that I could bring the Bolt back with me to make this video.  This will stay unlisted until the following video is up, and they'll be released to the public together.

I've been working on captions for this for the past hour and a half and I'm too tired to keep going.  I had planned to get captions done before I sent ...