Shinium - Brilliance by Design

So I trained a neural network (it's not really much of an artificial "intelligence", as this post will demonstate) on the entire collection of Hartnell-era Doctor Who scripts. This network was set to use whole words - some only use characters. Very simply, the network tries to follow words with other words which it thinks are likely to be in that position, based on what it 'knows' about the order words appear in the training text. Rinse and repeat. As the system trains it gets better at putting words in order, but still makes some weird choices: These files have been edited for clarity, capitalisation, line breaks and so on, but not actual content - that's all from the softwatre. -------------------------------------  [ outside the TARDIS ] (The Doctor is trying to confuse them) DOCTOR: Oh, it's very kind of you. BARBARA: Oh, Doctor, what's wrong? DOCTOR: Oh, it's a huge, isn't it? IAN: Yes. DOCTOR: Oh, my dear, I'm sure yo...

A set of silver stacking rings featuring the famous "Amen break" More on  the Amen break here . Of course it's relatively simple to apply this technique to any other sound sample. Maybe the Apache break, or Funky Drummer. Or even something which isn't a breakbeat. 

The question of pickling jewellery seems to come up quite a lot. What can I use as pickle? What's the best? Short answer is that any acid will work to "pickle" (to remove oxides from after heating) copper or silver. Longer answer is that some acids are more effective, quicker, than others. Much longer answer is this video in which I test vinegar, citric acid, sodium bisulphate (aka pH down aka safety pickle) and phosphoric acid against each other. For some reason Blogger embeds video at tiny size, so if you'd prefer then  click here to watch on YouTube .

I trained a neural network on the various party's manifestos and now I want to vote for it. All text generated by AN COMPUTER which didn't understand words until a few hours ago (and still doesn't) and now it's making almost as much sense as our glorious leaders.. All images licensed for reuse.

So, I make quite a few tutorial videos and people always say "yeah, that's cool but what if I don't have all that gear" Well, hopefully this video addresses that problem.

A custom request from a lady of excellent taste, asking for a spitfire ring. Challenge accepted! This video shows how to casting a spitfire using the Delft clay casting system. Delft clay is an oilsand designed for fine casts - it's a mixture of sand, clay and oil. The process is fairly straightforward but as you'll see, it's not as failsafe as other casting methods. I got it right second time though!

I was given a load of old sterling jewellery to make into something new. The video shows the first stage, to melt it down into useful ingots. Once poured, the ingots need cleaning to remove impurities that have come to the surface. The melt-pour-clean process may need repeating several times. Once clean, the ingots can be recast, or forged/rolled into sheet or wire. Casting video to follow soon.