Recent good YouTubes

Here's a list of recent good videos I stumbled across and enjoyed.

Torpedo Bats

It's cool to see a bunch of semi-pro baseball guys on YouTube testing out whether the new torpedo bat designs are really amazing or if they're mostly hype. This one from one of the Savanah Bananas players tests out regular bats versus the new designs and it mirrors what I've seen in similar tests. Basically, if you hit the ball perfectly on the "bulge" of the new bats you will definitely hit longer home runs, but a regular bat probably works better in most situations overall.

(side note: baseball has a lot of macho "manly" culture, so I love seeing the Bananas take the sport a little less seriously and create an entertainment version of baseball that's basically like the Harlem Globetrotters but I also love seeing these jocks walking around wearing pink and yellow too)

Knife making

If you've ever enjoyed an episode of Forged in Fire, you might recognize the creator here, Jesse Hu, from his string of victories on the show, as he became one of the winningest knife makers on it. His latest work is easily one of the most beautiful knives I've ever seen, and feels like a full month of work edited down to a few minutes.

Another redesigner

Here's another designer doing unsolicited logo/brand redesigns and this one is for a small sandwich shop in Utah that gets his full Madison Avenue treatment. In the end, I love the work and ideas throughout though maybe it's almost too perfect which gives it a mildly corporate look, which kind of undercuts the whole local shop vibe.

The video is also insanely well-done. Beautifully shot and edited, it's a new channel that I'll be following closely since it has such strong visuals right out of the gate.

Woodworking

I still love zoning out to any and all woodworking videos but this one where a guy 3D prints out a large-scale Spirograph jig to router out a design into a tabletop that he fills with epoxy ticks all my 1970's nostalgia boxes. It's totally gorgeous at the end.

Dear Chipotle…

This video is amazing, a nerdy guy who eats at Chipotle decides to design a new device to make sealing up the bowls instant and easier for workers there. The best moments in this are when he goes into a store to show employees, and you can see them hesitate as they wonder "what this guy is trying to show us?!" but after he does a demo, everyone working at a Chipotle goes totally nuts for it. It's perfectly captures a real exuberance and emotion from strangers that makes you root for the guy and everyone that works there. I hope this project ends up at every Chipotle someday.